The summit of the two Americas

HAVANA — Obama went to Panama to save the pan-American system, threatened by the exclusion of Cuba. It was a unanimous demand from the Latin American and Caribbean countries, in solidarity with one of their own, who, besides, had the symbolic value of having established its independence from the United States.

That dilemma was one of the factors that catalyzed the United States’ decision to begin a process to “normalize” relations with Cuba, thus improving the climate in which the U.S. would participate in the Seventh Summit of the Americas.

Cuba’s presence was considered by most of the participants, including Obama himself, as the beginning of a new state in hemispheric relations. And Cuba’s negotiations with the United States became a historic event when, for the first time since the triumph of the Revolution in 1959, their respective presidents met in a “respectful, constructive and productive” environment, as described by Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez.

However, it was not possible to concretize the re-establishment of diplomatic relations and the opening of embassies, as the United States hoped, mostly because of the clouds that gathered over the forum as a result of the ill-conceived presidential decree that declares Venezuela a threat to the national security of the United States and imposes sanctions on some of its officials.

Never mind that the U.S. government repeatedly stated that the decree was only a legal formality to apply sanctions against people whom the United States considers violators of human rights in Venezuela. That action was interpreted as a new demonstration of U.S. interference in the domestic affairs of Latin American and Caribbean nations, reviving the reservations that had caused the demand for Cuba’s inclusion in the Summit, this time expressed with an almost unanimous support for Venezuela.

Such a gaffe could not be corrected either by the experienced diplomat Thomas Shannon, when he visited Venezuela to meet with President Nicolás Maduro, or by Obama before he traveled to Panama, when he said the opposite from what he had stated in his decree, i.e., that Venezuela was not a threat to the United States’ national security.

Finally, the damage control included an “informal” meeting between Obama and Maduro, although no one knows which will be the actual consequences of the whole event.

According to President Rafael Correa of Ecuador, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega (who has much experience in these bouts) cautioned Maduro that the famous decree was only the tip of the iceberg of a much more ambitious subversive plan.

Whether this was a fact or the result of a wrong calculation by some “expert” advisor on Latin America, the reality is that the effect sought by the decree was diluted in Panama and Maduro’s government emerged from the encounter stronger, even in terms of Venezuela’s domestic society.

It should be noted that, notwithstanding the confrontations, the Latin American and Caribbean presidents were generally kind to Obama, making an effort to keep his person apart from their criticism of U.S. foreign policy.

President Raúl Castro said that Obama was not guilty of the history of U.S. attacks against Cuba and that he considered Obama “an honest man” who needed help in his domestic struggle against the blockade.

Maduro, for his part, extended his hand to Obama, although he said that the U.S. president had threatened his country and that he, Maduro, did not trust U.S. foreign policy.

And Obama spoke almost from a personal standpoint, as if his ideas went in one direction and his country’s policy in another, which reflects the polarization that exists in the U.S. political body.

Obama presented a hypothetical project of hemispheric relations in the future and tried to shield himself from criticism by saying that, with the new policy toward Cuba, he had fulfilled the commitment he made six years ago in Port of Spain, Trinidad & Tobago, when he promised “a new beginning” in U.S. relations with the region.

However, many of the hemispheric presidents did not understand it that way and reminded him of so many things that Obama ended up rejecting the history they were telling him and left the hall disappointed and indignant. He did reappear for the group photo, however, looking grim.

If the Summit made anything clear, it was the differences between the U.S. and Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as the inadequacy of U.S. policy to deal with them, even though some felt that a reassessment was needed, in the light of the economic problems besetting the region and the ability of the U.S. hegemony to energize it, thanks to a relative improvement in the U.S. economy.

At least, this was not what was achieved in Obama’s earlier meeting with the CARICOM, where he attempted to distance them from Petrocaribe, much less in the Summit.

What did fall into question was the ability of the pan-American system to bring together the interests of the continent. The result was that, once again, the Summit was unable to adopt a final resolution due to the lack of consensus with the United States and Canada.

Several delegations pointed to the need to reform this system and questioned the role of the Organization of American States, as currently conceived. Rafael Correa proposed that the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) should act as a bloc within the OAS and let the OAS serve only to settle the differences between the countries of Our America, as defined by José Martí, and the Other America, represented by the Anglo-Saxon countries of the north.

This might be difficult to achieve in the short range, but Correa is right when he affirms that our history, culture and national interests separate us, reaffirming the need for Latin American and Caribbean integration, which doesn’t mean that dialogue and convenient accords are impossible. What is needed is a relevant change in U.S. policy toward the region.

There’s nothing better than the case of Cuba to demonstrate that there can be “an agreement that contains disagreements,” as President Raúl Castro said, and still establish a civilized coexistence where any issue can be discussed, no matter how thorny, and mechanisms can be established for cooperation in matters of mutual interest.

Let us hope that the United States understands that it is in the presence of a changed world and that it must adjust its policies to this reality. The opposite would be like acting like the scorpion that, because of its very nature, chooses to drown after stinging the frog that’s helping it to cross the river.