Pro-Castro or Pro-Freedom?

For now on 50 years American leaders have held firm to a non-engagement policy towards Fidel Castro's communist regime in Cuba, yet despite the embargo's dramatic lengths to nurse wounded national pride over past successes by the island dictator, its does little to promote economic tendencies favoring American companies or the toppling of the socialist government in the nation.

At the outset, it is somewhat easier to understand exactly why the embargo was put in place. The CIA's tactical failure and Jack Kennedy's inability to use sense and deploy bombers left what might have been the coup of the century into absolute disarray. Hoping to cover for himself and all the innocents who he allowed to die at the hands of Castro, Kennedy moved to support the embargo as a means of stalling Cuabn growth and punishing the nation's leader. Yet two factors stood in the way: Russian influence and the socialist tendency. Not only did the Kremlin send aid to Cuba; it also authorized a rush of military arms and nuclear weapons in hopes of being within 90 miles of the American coast during the 1960s, a move which easily might have sprung into war.

 (Courtesy of baiganchoka.com)

Then of course socialism has always been an option for the Cuban leader's methodology beyond the helping hands of the now-extinct Soviet assistance. And as time goes on, the lack of trade which the United States has supported leaves Castor with a viable blame for any mistake he makes (and has made) as leader of the nation. In a sorry attempt to preserve national image, America has actually bolstered the declining regime by preventing the spread of welath which would likely bring about its ruin.

In the world today it is difficult enough to find good trade partners who do not rely solely on their own exports, and Cuba is a fine example of this horrific dilemma. Instead of providing America with cheaper sugars and a vantage point for its companies, the nation is stringently anti-West and hard-nosed towards the leaders of Washington. As such American has created its own enemy, except in this case with no strategic reason to do so. Our intelligence services must deal with the additional threat of Cuba without an intense need to do so, a a tragedy of epic proportions in the modern world.

If it will ever come, the economic liberalization should be encouraged today. As long as Fidel Castro maintains a scapegoat for his troubles and policies of structural failure, Cuba will continue to hold views negative of Americans and their government's policy in the circles of foreign affairs. Bring an end to the blockage of trade, and the crimson revolutionary forces will capitulate in the face of market power.




Michael Veramendi

National Alliance Vice President for Foreign Issues