The unrealistic dreams of a US comeback to Cuba.
By Eva Belfrage
October 19, 2014

Every year at this time intensive campaigns are being launched to demand an economic opening of the United States to the communist island of Cuba, who every year raises the question in the UN to get international support for its critique of the US embargo and thinks that its aggressive propaganda against the US would help in these efforts.

The interest of media in particular in the US for the lifting of the embargo is without proportions. Just scroll on google and you will find that there is no end to the lobbying. There seems to be an army of journalists probably paid by Cuba and American businessmen alike to lobby for the lifting of the embargo.  Article upon article and endless debates with the same argument that: ”The US embargo has not led to a change to democracy in Cuba in over 50 years, so we’d better lift it to see if there will be a change.” But nobody really believes that dictators leave power when they are compensated or treated as decent parties. History tells us quite the opposite.

So why do these campaigns get so much support? The answer is simple: Money or raw capitalism, as the prehistoric ”revolutionaries” would say. American business and the Castro military business owners in Cuba have the same dream – a US comeback in Cuba - and the world wide leftist anti-American lobby fall into the campaign chorus for the sole pleasure of being able to criticize the United States for the embargo.

Democracy and freedom from oppression are outdated concepts in the world we live in today. Most governments would never lose a good market or business for the critique of a dictatorship or an oppressive regime. And leftist ideologists always stand up for leftist dictators, no matter what, believing that communist totalitarianism is far better than free market and democracy. In this confused world the US government’s decision to stay out of Cuba until democracy is established should therefore be both respected and applauded.

Why do they dream?

Cuba:

For the Castro regime external support is a question of life or death. They have always been a beggar regime supported from outside, never being able by itself to feed its population. For 20 years the regime was taken under the wing of the Soviet Union and the island fared rather well during these years, although normal maintenance of infrastructure and investments for the future was totally neglected. When the Soviet Union collapsed and Cuba was abandoned, a situation of severe hunger developed, people even turned blind from lack of vitamins and tens of thousands fled the country.

Then Venezuela was asked to step in and save the nation with its oil resources. Hugo Chavez was mesmerized by Fidel Castro into a submissive and obedient donor and under his successor Nicolas Maduro the Castros have taken the control of the regime in Venezuela and the country is so mismanaged that a total chaos of repression and persecution of the opposition, violent crime, corruption along with nationalizations and a party managed economy has led to an unstoppable inflation, lack of food and consumer goods. The country is on the brink of collapse in spite of one of the world’s biggest oil reserves. It is obvious that Venezuela cannot afford to be generous with Cuba any more.

Perhaps foreseeing a possible instability in Venezuela, the Castros approached Brazil a few years ago and received an impressive investment in the construction of a new harbor in Mariel. This deep water harbor is of such dimensions however, that it could not profit without substantial trade with the big neighbor the United States, and the lifting of the embargo is therefore of prime interest also for the Brazilians.

The general economic situation in Cuba is bad. The so called reforms have not led anywhere, except for the sleeping port of Mariel, investors are shying away and the small pity private sector opened a few years ago, has as foreseen and to a large extent been closed down and is constantly sabotaged by the regime. The country survives on the tourist industry, remittances from exiled Cubans, and on export of mass produced medical doctors. But it is not enough for feeding the population and maintaining basic health and school systems. Life has become unbearable for most Cubans and in the country side the situation is critical. Never since the hard years of the so called Special Period have so many Cubans fled the island as this last year.

Without scruples the Castros beg around in all directions. They are not ashamed of offending its eternal enemy the United States, while they at the same time fall on their knees to ask them for money, tourists and investments. Obama has lifted parts of the embargo regarding remittances and tourism of Cuban Americans and cultural exchange programs, but no signs of change to democracy and respect of human rights are seen in Cuba, on the contrary. The Castros constantly lash out against the Cuban exile community in Miami, but they beg them to send as much money as they can to the island and they are very welcome to the island, as long as they are not known to have criticized the regime and on that the Castros keep well informed through their spies and informers.

The Castro regime desperately dreams of incomes from tourism by the large, general population in the US, and particularly the very rich with yachts and luxurious interests like golf. They also want to buy consumer goods on credit in the US to bolster the elite’s luxurious life and for maintaining its large costs for intelligence, army and police corps. Today they can only buy with cash in the US and purchases (after a partial lifting of the embargo for emergency supplies) are limited to food and medicine.

It cannot be expected that the Castros are planning to invest anything for the wellbeing of the population. It was never their intentions during their 55 years in power. School and health was part of the Soviet requirements, but when they left, these sectors fell into decay. The Castros and their military entrepreneurs in power are only interested in staying on their posts, to enrich themselves or maintain their privileged lives. For this they don’t need to feed the people, but they need resources for control of the discontented. The Cuban population has after 55 years of oppression turned into the main threat to the regime, while the United States is solely used as an ideological excuse for staying in power and for its external and internal propaganda.

For many decades the US has not been a military threat to Cuba not even to the Castro regime. An increasing number of family members of the Cuban elite live part of their times in the US and their children study there. The US is even accepting officials of the Castro family to make propaganda tours in the country. So the relations between the Castros and the US government could today be described as a mixture of condemnation and acceptance. The US maintains however its rights to keep an economic distance to the dictatorship in Cuba, while the Castros continue the agressive anti US propaganda, still hoping for a lifting of the embargo.

The United States:

The US business community wants to lay its hands on the enormous opportunities that this impoverished island represents in forms of needs, and that is before it is too late and other countries like Brazil, China, Spain, Canada and others take the lot. There is quite a noisy lobby in the US among business people for lifting the embargo.

It is however difficult to see that they would profit much with an opening of the Cuban market now, as Cuba is so poor that it has hardly any money to buy anything, if it is not on long term credits, that they often refuse to pay. Tourism, one of Cuba’s main income sources could be interesting for American business, as long as it doesn’t involve investments locally in Cuba, as this is both risky and dangerous. Also trade agreements with Cuba can be risky as you never know if they will pay.

Nobody with any sense of reality would dare to make larger investments in Cuba today, as this country is both corrupt and capricious and offers no entrepreneurial security. Investors in Cuba run great risks of property expropriation and long term jail sentences. Any investor in Cuba engaging local work force will be forced to abuse human rights and disrespect international labor laws. Thus no ideal situation for investments in Cuba today.

It is possible that the US business community thinks that if they don’t take the risks now, they will lose opportunities when Cuba is free and democratic and large funds may be available for its reconstruction. When Cuba is free the population and its new decision makers will however and most likely remember who cooperated with the tyrants and abused their labor rights and these businesses may not be very welcome in the future.

So what is the deal for American business and its supporting media lobby with the idea of lifting the embargo on Cuba? César Alarcon, member of the ”Inner circle of the US Senate”, reported to CDV.org how he entered a meeting at the Brooking Institute for American business with  Eusebio Leal, a government official from Havana, Cuba, who was looking for American investment funds. Alarcon proposed to him, that the Cuban government as a good gesture should start by giving back the properties expropriated from Cuban citizens and invite them to the island, as they could make a good job as the original owners. The answer by Leal was clear: ”You are dreaming. This would be like returning the head to Joan of Arc.”  The answer caused a big part of the audience to leave the room. This story illustrates how unrealistic representatives of the US business community can be about the situation in Cuba, also among those who made an effort to attend such a meeting. Alarcon said that Leal after the meeting had exclaimed: ”You destroyed the meeting!”.

Yes, the unrealistic dreams of a US comeback in Cuba were destroyed that day for the Cuban dictators and the American business people alike.

Governments and leftist movements

Many governments in the world, particularly poor developing countries are critical of the United States. They probably judge the US with a generalized preconception that ’US is the super military power of the world with imperialistic ambitions and represents crude capitalism, which doesn’t care about the poor’. The noisy and five decade long anti-American position in Cuba therefore appeals to these governments and the Castro regime does everything it can to connect with them. There are very few countries in the third world who don’t receive a few Cuban medical doctors, nurses or teachers. All these countries are then obliged to return their gratitude with an unconditional support for Cuba in international fora as the UN, particularly with regard to the US embargo.

The same pattern is followed with the leftist movements and parties in the world. Their connections with Cuba as the leading voice on criticizing the US, is natural and for them Cuba is not a dictatorship, as no communist or leftist dictator can ever be defined as dictator or oppressive. Cuba stands up for the poor in the world, and the misery and suffering from oppression of the Cuban population is according to their views not caused by the Castro regime but by the US and its embargo. They argue that a lifting of the embargo and an opening for American investments, would reduce poverty and repression in Cuba. In spite of their critique of the US, they don’t seem to be against a US come back in Cuba, as long as the Castro regime is promoting it and as long as the US capitalists can be handled as useful idiots to help keeping their idols, the Castro family and its military junta in power.

As regards European governments most of them support the lifting of the US embargo in the UN, because nowadays governments are, as it seems, only interested in business and trade and really don’t care that a lifting of the US embargo would mean a direct support to the Castro repression and a perpetuation of the dictatorship in Cuba. In the European Community Spain is the leading voice in the relations with Latin America, and Spain with all its tourist hotels in Cuba, is now promoting a closer cooperation between EU and the communist Cuba.

Conclusions

Business at all costs, be it small or insignificant, ridiculous, risky, or even dangerous, but business first is the general trend of governments today. Democratic values and human rights are no longer defended. In this surrounding of deteriorated values it is indeed laudable that the United States stands up firmly against the oppressive and economically incompetent dictatorship in Cuba and defends the undisputable rights of the United States to keep a distance to and choose not to trade with a tyrant regime, which fills its jails with political and innocent prisoners and terrorizes its population to exhaustion and mass escape.

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