Quo vadis, Cuba?

A forgotten land

Cuba stopped being an important country in world geopolitics a long time ago. With the end of the Cold War and the United States as the world’s only superpower, Fidel’s role became reduced to the annoying neighbour’s one, the one you can’t charge his debts because he does not let you to do so, and the one you must wait for to die to see if you can enter his inventory’s drawing.

Cuba was a significant country when it provided weapons for armies in order to mess in other’s wars, such the Angolan War, it had guerrilla fighters with martyr’s vocation, sponsored the “two, three, many Vietnams” and hugged the Soviet Kremlin, making its neighbour’s hair stand on end.

The disappearance of the USSR and the huge economic issues caused because of the absence of its main ally, the American embargo and its own economic mistakes, which forced Cuba to abandon the proletarian internationalism to prop its domestic revolution up, caused its own disappearance from the news headlines and the CIA’s priorities.

Ten to one

Nevertheless, the economic blockade persisted, not for national security reasons, defence of the democracy or the fight against communism, but for mere pride. Ten US presidents have passed for the White House, trying everything to finish Fidel and his revolution, from murder, armed invasion and political isolation, to slander propaganda, commercial vetoes and diplomatic intrigues, without getting anything.

On the contrary, and against all prognostics, the debacle did not happen and Cuban society has obtained interesting achievements, besides the sports victories, which are themselves a feat because its small population. Medical advances, high level education, a thriving culture, and rates of infant mortality, schooling, natality, healthcare, nutrition at the levels of developed countries.

The revolution’s grays

Unfortunately, there are some buts which cast shadows over the Revolution. Zealots in order to defend the achievements and keeping at bay the neighbour which caused so much damage in the past, its rulers, leaded by Fidel, suppressed any dissent by restricting the civil liberties. They haven’t allow the revolution to air and refresh and therefore avoidable mistakes, invisible in the middle of unanimity, have anchored in Cuban society, adopting a dictatorial model, based in a single party and a powerful military class.

Nevertheless, Cuba is a living example that it is indeed possible to build a different path from the one set by the United States, multilateral credit organizations and the economy of waste. And this is in great part because of Fidel who, with his charisma and strength, knew how to join the Cuban people against the former caudillo, who thought he had registered perpetually Cuba’s destiny.

The transition

Today, Cuba is back to the headlines because Fidel is getting close to his death and the ones thinking with desire are rubbing their hands together because the revolution of dignity has come to its end. An example of what the former owners think is the cover of The Economist current issue. The picture tells a lot because it summarizes the thinking of the ones reducing the world to Coca-Cola, Visa, and Hollywood. The rest does not exist for them. But there are other possible worlds.

For now, the only thing that changes with Fidel’s resignation is that the transition time has started, but under the guidance of the very same leader. Cuba is preparing for the post-Fidel era with Raúl Castro as its leader. His advanced age (76 years-old), his orthodoxy, though moderate, and his brother’s shadow do not let him to play a role as the Deng Xiaoping’s, the architect of the modern China. But in the little time he has left, it will open the path for leaders as Carlos Lage or Felipe Pérez Roque to take the wheel.

The Second Revolution

With the generational changeover, it’s clear that post-Fidel Cuba will be more pragmatic. Politically ortodox but economically liberal, getting close to the Chinese and Vietnamese models. This implies the search for friends which can help Cuba to achieve with better results its full incorporation to the international community. A winning option is the president of Brazil, Lula da Silva, whom the very same Raúl is getting close to.

Even though the Venezuelan aid is considerable (i. e., 90,000 oil barrels a day), the new Cuban leaders acknowledge that Hugo Chávez’s radicalism may close many doors for them. Therefore, prudently, they are distancing from him. Their contempt of kidnapping as a revolutionary weapon and Cuba’s role as a mediator in Colombian armed conflict are clear examples that they will go with their friend until its grave but they will not bury with him.

Dulles rides again

Resources:

Colombian government “respects” Fidel Castro’s decision to step down

Without Fidel in the middle, the United States will normalize its relations with Cuba, specially in trade, the same way it did with Vietnam, is doing with Libya and did a lot of time ago with China. Nevertheless, though Barack Obama, the possible Democrat presidential candidate, has said he, if elected, would speak to Fidel or his successor, there’s no visible change in the US attitude toward the Cuban regime.

The odds is that the embargo becomes relaxed as the political opening occurs, which will not be as radical as the Cuban exile and the White House expect, but just enough to start making business, which is all about at the end. As the then Secretary of State John Foster Dulles told the Mexican president Adolfo López Mateos: "The United States of America does not have friends; it has interests".

This article was originally published 22 February 2008. Translated from Spanish by Julián Ortega Martínez

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