(HOST) Commentator, storyteller and contractor, Willem Lange, urges a change in the United States’ policy toward Cuba.
(LANGE) The first tourist to arrive in Cuba was Columbus in 1492. He left convinced it held treasures that would enrich Spain and make his own fortune.
Almost every enterprising tourist since then has had a similar reaction. Slavers, plantation owners, fruit company executives, prospectors, politicians – all have desired a piece of the island. But not until the battleship Maine exploded in Havana Harbor did the United States have a pretext to separate Cuba from Spain. There followed fifty years of corrupt dictators.
Civil liberties deteriorated; popular uprisings routinely marred the peace. About 20,000 Cubans were murdered during the regime of Fulgencio Batista. Then in 1956 a group of political exiles led by Fidel Castro motored from Mexico to Cuba in a leaky old yacht and joined other dissident groups opposing the Batista regime. The United States looked on benevolently while both Batista and the Meyer Lansky mob (who’d been running Batista’s casinos on a profit-sharing basis) decamped, and the revolutionaries assumed power.
Soon it appeared the revolutionaries were Marxists. They closed the casinos and nationalized private industry, offering compensation the previous owners deemed insufficient.
It’s difficult today to appreciate what hysteria Communism used to provoke among us. In March 1960 President Eisenhower forbade the purchase of Cuban sugar and ended deliveries of United States petroleum. He formalized an arms embargo and aided the organization of a counterrevolutionary force of Cuban exiles. The Soviet Union picked up the slack and provided, at far less cost, all that we had withdrawn.
After the Cuban missile crisis, Cuba became less an opportunity than a responsibility for the Soviets. In March 1962 President Kennedy forbade the importation of all goods from Cuba. (Reportedly, just before signing the bill, Kennedy sent Pierre Salinger out to procure 1200 of the best Cuban cigars.) Later he prohibited travel to Cuba; and we’ve been imposing more stringent sanctions ever since.
It’s all been counterproductive. With the end of Soviet subsidies, Cuba invited investment from other countries. During a trip there in 2002, we stayed in a Norwegian hotel and dined with about forty French cyclists in an Italian restaurant. School kids sought us out, speaking perfect English. I want very much to return, but my government says I can’t.
With Fidel’s retirement, we have an opportunity. Have we got to wait until all the Cold Warriors die before we grasp it? We deal with other distasteful regimes – China, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Venezuela – because they have resources we need or are too important to offend.
Repression has never succeeded; engagement has almost never failed. With a new administration in the offing, we have a chance at last to make a change.
This is Willem Lange in East Montpelier, and I gotta get back to work.