The nightmare scenario

By
Phil Peters                                                                           Read Spanish Version

Taken
from his blog The Cuban Triangle.

Here
are a few comments on a University
of Miami essay
by Professor Jaime Suchlicki and Jason Poblete, “When Should the
U.S. Change Policy Toward Cuba.”

The
authors begin by discussing the confusion involved in the terms
“transition” and “succession.” I thought the Administration
defined the terms pretty well: “transition” meant a change in
political system, “succession” a change in leadership with the
system unchanged. Then the Administration confused
the issue
completely, giving us one more reason not to rely on our own
government for analysis of what’s going on in Cuba. In my book,
what has occurred is pretty clear: Cuba’s leadership has changed,
the system hasn’t.

The
authors’ real point, however, is to stand up for the all-or-nothing
U.S. policy in the Helms-Burton law, which provides that only a
complete change in Cuba’s political system, not partial reform, can
trigger any easing of U.S. sanctions. They underscore that the law
provides that “a transition government cannot include either Fidel
Castro or Raul Castro.” Actually, the law goes them one better; it
says that a “democratically elected government” cannot include
Fidel or Raul, which is worth chewing over for a minute.

Set
aside your supposition about Raul Castro’s chances in a free
election in Cuba — would he get 12 percent? 51 percent? 70 percent?
— and contemplate that this law says that if Cuba were to free
political prisoners; allow a free press, political parties, and labor
unions to operate; dissolve state security; and hold elections under
international observation; then the result would not be a
“democratically elected” government if it were to include Raul
Castro. In other words, it defines not only the processes that Cubans
must follow to achieve democracy, it also sets conditions on the
result. Its message to Cubans is simple: Hold an election and satisfy
all our conditions, but if you elect Raul we won’t accept the
result as democratic. Helms-Burton, in this sense, is purely
anti-democratic. But this is the provision of the law that these
authors hold up virtually as sacred writ in an essay devoted to
democracy in Cuba and the constancy of democratic principles in U.S.
foreign policy. Go figure.

Regarding
those principles, the authors try mightily to cram the current U.S.
approach toward Cuba into the mainstream of U.S. foreign policy,
implying that any deviation amounts to “supporting regimes and
dictators that violate human rights.” They reach back to the Ford
Administration, ignoring that Ford offered to normalize relations
without demanding that Cuba change its political system. They ignore
that Presidents of both parties have long promoted American contact
with citizens and officials in communist countries as a means of
promoting U.S. influence, all the while maintaining our moral
disapproval of the communist system. They ignore the 1992 Cuba
Democracy Act, a law embraced by the late Jorge Mas Canosa, which
offered to ease U.S. sanctions in response to political or economic
openings in Cuba — the precise opposite of the Helms-Burton
approach.

There’s
more. They set up an old straw man, claiming that proponents of
engagement with Cuba believe that engagement will produce regime
change. (Some do, I’ll admit, but they are wrong. There are many
benefits
to engagement,
but if you want regime change the only honest path is to make an
unjustifiable call for military action.) They make the tired and
customary insinuation about the motives of proponents of engagement.
They argue that the tourism industry “is the one area of the
economy on which the government, besides oil exploration, on which
[sic] the future economic survival of the island depends.”
Nonsense. They suggest negotiations with Cuba, which now makes us all
dialogueros,
I guess. Jason and Jaime, welcome to the club.

Beneath
it all, my hunch is that the authors are beginning to grapple with a
scenario that may soon confront us.

No
one knows whether, when, or how much Raul Castro would liberalize
Cuba’s economy. But what if he does, even in small ways, as
Suchlicki himself expects? What if an opening produces positive
economic results? What if those results earn him some political
approval from Cubans who are sick of orthodoxy and eager to have
opportunities to provide for themselves and their families?

What
if Americans would react by saying that a degree of liberalization,
even if limited, is a positive development? How would we react to a
scenario where Cuban policies are changing and Cubans of all
political persuasions are debating what should come next? The next
question would be to ask, pragmatically, what to do? Are there any
tools in U.S. policy that would encourage a greater opening?

At
that point, we would crash right into the big question posed by
Suchlicki and Poblete. And the answer, they remind us, is dictated in
our law: We would do absolutely nothing until Cuba’s political
system is transformed and Raul Castro is gone.

We
would greet a scenario of new possibilities as spectators with our
feet in concrete. We would make the perfect the enemy of the good,
which is not a typical American approach. 

In
that scenario, Americans might then look for different options. The
system of laws enacted in response to Fidel Castro might lose their
sacrosanct quality. The Calle Ocho argument that anyone who seeks a
different approach toward Cuba is abandoning democratic values and
supporting dictatorship, might seem a little ridiculous.

That’s
why an economic opening in Cuba after Fidel would be a hopeful sign
for some, and the political nightmare of a lifetime for others.

Philip
Peters works with the Lexington Institute in Washington, DC. Since
1996 he has traveled regularly to Cuba to monitor and write about
economic and political developments. Peters is an advisor to the Cuba
Working Group in the House of Representatives.

http://cubantriangle.blogspot.com/2007/08/nightmare-scenario.html