Looking ahead through
By
Alvaro F. Fernandez Read Spanish Version
alfernandez@the-beach.net
My
father passed away May 18, 2001 — exactly seven years ago this week.
I am glad he never saw Sept. 11 of that year. I have a feeling he had
felt it coming, though. Not exactly what happened, maybe, but he knew
the world was changing, drastically.
The
fact is that 9/11 has become a before-and-after moment. The truth is,
for me, it has not been the same … before and after May 18 and
Sept. 11.
I
bring up my father because at his death he had a very pessimistic
outlook on the world and where it was headed. But, strange as it may
sound, I believe that if there was one area where he felt optimism,
it dealt with Cuba’s potential and future. I call it strange
because when you think of persons of his generation, especially with
his trajectory and résumé, and his dealings with Cuba
and Fidel Castro, you’d expect the exact opposite.
Looking
back, I found a 1993 copy of Contrapunto magazine, a now defunct
publication once published by Nicolás Ríos, who, I
believe, still lives in Miami. In the Oct.-Nov. issue of that year,
Ríos published an interview he conducted with Ángel
Fernández Varela, parts of which are still worth reading.
Worth reading because it shows that in Miami there are, and have
been, men and women who, without sacrificing principles, have laid it
on the line when it came to Cuba. It also shows that on all sides of
this issue there are, and have been, men and women who truly love
Cuba and want to see only what’s best for this island nation my
father predicted was destined to be “The spring season of the
world. A jewel and a model system.” His answers and thoughts, found
in this interview, still apply today, 15 years later,
‘Cuba
is destined to be the spring season of the world’
Ángel
Fernandez Varela is one of the most outstanding and respected
personalities in Greater Miami’s social, political and economic
environment, and, without a doubt, one of the most important
Cuban-Americans in the United States. As proof that that is his fate
and habit, he was the same in Cuba. There, he was, among many other
things, a House Representative and editor of Información,
one of the most important newspapers of the period.
Note:
At the time of this interview, Ángel Fernández Varela
was chairman of the board of the Consolidated Bank en Miami.
Excerpts
of an interview conducted by Nicolás Ríos in 1993 in
Contrapunto magazine.
Q.:
Ángel
Fernández Varela was an outstanding opponent of the Cuban
government from the beginning of the revolutionary process. I would
like you to talk a bit about that and about how you have been
modifying your attitude in that regard.
A.:
[…] I
worked with and for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). With the
Agency from late 1959 to shortly after the Bay of Pigs invasion; and
for the Agency from shortly after the invasion to about 1968. […]
The distinction between "with" and "for" is to me
very important in a personal sense, but this is not the time to go
into it. […]
Q.:
Why
the change in your attitude regarding a solution to the Cuban
problem?
A.:
[…]
Beginning in 1965, facts on one hand and the maturity of my thought
on another led me to the most absolute disenchantment and, better
said, disbelief in almost everything that was done and said. To flee
from the local panorama, and because the Agency was looking for a
Latino who might serve as a war correspondent in Vietnam, I applied
for the job. We’re talking about, maybe, 1967. My application was
turned down because, as they told me at the time, it didn’t seem
reasonable that a Cuban political refugee (which I was) would show up
as a correspondent in Vietnam. […] Shortly thereafter, I was
offered a post in Virginia that I did not accept.
Of
course, and as a comment, I’ll tell you that the argument that a
Cuban political refugee was not suitable as a Vietnam correspondent
did not sit well with me, because only a few months earlier I had
given my son Ángel, 17, written authorization to join the Army
and go to Vietnam as a volunteer. If he was good enough to fight, I
didn’t understand why I couldn’t cover the fight.
But
let us return to 1965. Since before that year, the experiences I had
acquired had taken me to a process of analysis. This analysis led to
me to the conclusion that the solution to the Cuban problem was not
in the use of force, no matter how it was exercised. The Bay of Pigs
invasion had been a disaster. […] After the failure came the
commandos and the infiltration teams. Worse even than the invasion,
they were acts of irresponsibility and political cover-up by the
authorities that conceived them, prepared them and executed them,
without concern for the cost in human lives or the breakdown of moral
attitudes and conscience.
I
first made a public expression of my turnaround in 1968, I believe,
during the Gathering of Catholic Universities. One year later, in
1969, […] I published an article in Diario de las Américas
saying that "the events that began to stir us (in 1959) were the
beginning of a great universal crisis and that we should be among the
first to bring up, with bravery, a re-evaluation of the events that
would definitely bring to our country, painful though they may have
been, a brilliant and splendorous future." I ended by saying,
and I repeat it now, that "Cuba has been crisscrossed by almost
all the experiences of mankind, searching for formulas to build a
better and more just world. In that crisscrossing of experiences, our
nation can represent the catalytic element that will enable the
creation of an effective solution that will lead to a new political,
economic and social system."
Q.:
What
do you think about the Torricelli Law and the blockade of Cuba?
A.:
The
Torricelli Law is, in my opinion, unjust, absurd and immoral. It was
enacted for electoral reasons. […]
I
have been — and am — opposed to any embargo on any nation, be it
Haiti, South Africa or Cuba. The topic of the embargo is provoking
and inflames passions. […]
Among
the most recent, we can find economic embargos against North Korea,
China, South Africa, Vietnam, Haiti and Iraq. These embargos were
decreed mostly for the purpose of toppling the governments of those
countries or force them to change course. I invite you to analyze the
results; you will inescapably conclude that they were questionable,
not to say total failures. […]
Q.:
What
do you see in Cuba’s future? According to your experience,
accumulated in so many areas that are vital to unravel the outlook,
what do you forecast for our country?
A.:
The outlook could be excellent. […] It’s not our resources that
count; it’s our people. We must thank God a lot, in every sense. What
we’re missing is a unity of will to carry out our task. Personally, I
think our country has been called to be a jewel and a model of
systems, both political, social and economic.
I
always remember — and I’m going back to the Sixties — that when
events led to the so-called Prague Spring, I was troubled. I was
selfish, yes. I wanted Cuba to be the spring season of the world. The
Prague Spring never came to pass, but our spring can still come. I
trust in that, and I would like to be alive when the dawn comes.
