Note: This particular essay on Ana Margarita Martinez was first posted on Cubaninsider on November 2nd, 2011. Yet, for some reason, over a thousand people in one DAY dialed it up on February 20th, 2021!!! Soooo...here is a replay.
Ana Margarita Martinez
Born in Havana, Ana Margarita Martinez flowered into a beautiful woman...IN MIAMI!
Ana Margarita Martinez had a beautiful wedding...in Miami.
Juan Pablo Roque
Juan Pablo Roque became Ana Margarita's new husband.
Juan Pablo Roque
Juan Pablo Roque, a former pilot in the Cuban Air Force and a dear friend of Fidel Castro, was married to Ana Margarita Martinez for seven years in Miami. But like a lot of men, doggone it, Juan cheated on Ana...not with other women but with phone calls back to Havana, sometimes to Fidel himself. You see, Juan was a spy for Cuba in the very heart of anti-Fidel country -- Miami! His beautiful Cuban-exile wife, Ana, helped him fit into the Miami community, tight as a Rawlings baseball glove fits one's hand.
And Juan Pablo Roque was a real good spy. The above photo shows him after he had become friends with Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the U. S. congresswoman from Miami who (for God's sake!) happens to be the most anti-Fidel person on the planet! Ileana, of course, had something in common with Juan and Ana -- they were all born in Havana but gained fame in Miami. (Carl Hiaasen, the famous Miami Herald columnist and best-selling author, swears not everyone in Miami was born in Havana so I'll take his word for it but Ana, Ileana, and Juan were). Juan's job in Miami, in addition to being married to the beautiful Ana, was to keep Cuba informed of the undertakings of Brothers to the Rescue, Jose Basulto's non-profit operation that flew airplanes over the waters between Florida and Cuba, presumably to rescue endangered would-be Cuban defectors bound for Florida.
Jose Basulto
In the U. S. Jose Basulto and Brothers have been heralded as humanitarian wonders. In Cuba (and elsewhere) Basulto is considered a prime anti-Cuban terrorist who still brags about CIA-backed sabotage missions to Cuba even prior to the April-1961 Bay of Pigs attack. In any case, when the Clinton administration was set to normalize relations with Cuba, Basulto's planes not only flew into Cuban waters but over Havana itself, dropping leaflets, etc. and scaring citizens. Aware that he had no problem from U. S authorities, Basulto even took media people on some of his flights. Cuba begged the U. S. and then the U. N. to stop the flights, to no avail. (The U. S. allows Batistianos to make all its rules relating to Cuba and the U. S. has a veto in the U.N.). Brothers representatives used the Miami media to taunt Cuba, saying it had neither the courage nor the means to do anything about the overflights and, in any case, would be too afraid of U. S. retaliation if it dared to harm them. Hearing all that himself, and realizing Cuba did in fact plan to do something on its own after the U. S. and the U. N. ignored its pleas, Juan flew back to Havana, leaving Ana in Miami.
Two days after Juan arrived back in Havana, Fidel (as he admitted to Dan Rather and others) ordered the young Perez-Perez brothers to take two MIG jets into the skies to meet a trio of Brothers planes flying toward Cuba, with Basulto flying the lead plane. Two of the Brothers' planes were shot down, killing the four occupants. Basulto's plane returned safely to Miami. As Fidel has stated he knew it would, the provocation worked perfectly for the Batistianos and against Cuba because the downing of the Brothers' planes quickly altered President Clinton's plans 360 degrees -- from normalization to signing the Helms-Burton Bill, which to this day remains the most anti-Cuban and anti-America's-best-friends (because it punishes them too) portion of the infamous U. S. embargo against Cuba, which has been in effect since 1962. The U. S., using that bill, routinely fines international banks hundreds of millions of dollars for doing any business with Cuba, and the banks pay up because they must continue to deal with the world's economic giant. Norway is still livid at the U. S. for forcing a Cuban delegation, officially invited to Norway, to be evicted from its hotel in Oslo because the hotel was partially owned by U. S. interests. A heated editorial in the Oslo main newspaper strongly advised the U. S. to "keep your imperialist bullying out of our democratic country and try bullying a big boy like China with your genocide against little Cuba." Elected officials in Norway have been a lot harsher although some pro-American elected officials in Norway have wondered aloud (with a parliamentary statement) how in the world "a country as great and strong as the U. S. can allow a few exiles to harm their former country and the rest of the world at the same time." The Helms-Burton Bill was reportedly written by history's all-time most powerful anti-Fidel Cuban-exile Jorge Mas Canosa. (For details on that subject you should check the prolific writings of brilliant experts such as Ann Louise Bardach, Peter Kornbluh, and Wayne S. Smith). But Helms-Burton is still in effect, supposedly with a provision that it can never be legislatively changed, angering everybody (yes, as far away as Norway and beyond) except the most belligerent Cuban exiles as evidenced by last month's vote in the UN by all the world's nations. But, hey, let's forget politics and get back to our intriguing love story....
The historic episode, the shoot-down of the two Brothers' planes, instantly made a celebrity out of Ana Margarita Martinez in Miami and Juan Pablo Roque in Havana. An AP reporter stationed in Havana asked Juan what he missed most about Miami. He had a quick two-word reply, and it wasn't Ana Margarita! Juan replied (true story), "MY JEEP!!" As befits a cheater like Juan, the scorned little woman got to keep his prized jeep and the photo above shows Ana with that very jeep, the love of Juan's life. But, like any jilted woman born in Havana and raised in Miami, Ana didn't stop there...no way! She wrote one book about her celebrity and is now writing a second one. She, of course, has an agent who is also busy shopping her story around Hollywood. But the main payoff for Ana involves one of the most undemocratic nuances of the U. S. embargo against Cuba: The inclusion of Cuba on the short U. S. list of Nations That Sponsor Terrorism. The U. S. government, the majority of Americans, and the majority of people around the world don't think Cuba, the well-known victim of countless terror attacks emanating from Florida, should be on any list as a sponsor of terror. Juan as well as the famed Cuban Five (imprisoned for decades in the U. S.) were in Miami to try to prevent such terror attacks as the downing of the child-laded Cuban airliner in Oct.-1976 that killed all 73 aboard) and, in fact, they provided their information first-off to the U. S. FBI. However, a small cabal of the most vehement anti-Fidel Cuban exiles makes all the U. S. rules relating to Cuba, so that's why (yes, it's the only reason) Cuba is on America's list of the four nations that sponsor terror. (The Batistiano-aligned George W. Bush administration removed real terrorist sponsors like (the late) Gaddafi's Libya while it greatly strengthened the penalties against Cuba simply to appease Miami). Having Cuba on the Terror list means anyone can sue Cuba for absolutely anything in U. S. courtrooms, including those in Miami, and Cuba is never even represented in such lucrative farces. The families of the downed Brothers' pilots received hundreds of millions of dollars in that fashion. The families of Cubans killed in the Bay of Pigs attack on Cuba have similarly received millions of dollars. (The families of the 34 Japanese killed in the attack on Pearl Harbor have not been allowed to sue in U. S. courts, of course, because no ousted Japanese dictatorship has ever reconstituted itself on U. S. soil). The Cuban government doesn't pay the money but the U. S. government, thanks to things like the Helms-Burton Bill, has to support the verdicts so it uses frozen Cuban assets, such as the money Cuba is due for A T & T-taxed phone calls between the two nations, the same type money that Canada and Mexico routinely receive. And the U. S. government forces banks that have Cuban money to turn it over to those anti-Cuban verdicts. (Even international banks comply because those banks must continue dealing with the U. S., the world's dominant financial power). Thus, both Jose Basulto and Ana Margarita Martinez knew a good thing -- a Miami courtroom -- when they saw it. After the families sued and actually received countless millions, Basulto sued and, guess what? He won big! (Uh, remember, Basulto was well represented but Cuba was not represented at all). So, of course, Ana sued, accusing Cuba (not Juan) of rape. She, of course, won -- $7.175 million in personal damages and $20 million in punitive damages. If you add that up, Ana won $27.175 million. I assume it's the first time in history that a country has been successfully sued for raping a woman but perhaps it has happened in some other similar Banana Republic courtrooms that I am not aware of. Anyway, because so many plaintiffs successfully preceded Ana, Cuba's frozen assets have been depleted several times but with such things as telephone calls to and from Cuba those assets are still accruing, as every lawyer and every Cuban American in Miami well knows. So Ana's $27.175 million is getting there; she has even been awarded -- uh, this is true -- three Cuban airplanes that somehow ended up in South Florida. And, uh, Ana's lawyers in 2011 have notified all of the new U. S. airlines the Obama administration now allows to fly to and from Cuba that they must pay a percentage of each ticket to...Ana! Now, before I put this U. S. - Cuban reality story to bed, glance, if you will, back up at the above photo. It shows Ana Margarita Martinez with Juan Pablo Roque's fondest memory of Miami -- and it's his beloved jeep, not Ana! That jeep continues to make me feel sorry for Juan.
And glance once again at the beautiful and happy Ana. Any woman who has had a divorce settlement in which her husband was never represented and his country was never represented would smile like that, don't you think? "Only in America," you say. Yes true, but don't forget this caveat. "Only in America since January of 1959 when the ousted Batista dictatorship in Cuba was reconstituted in Miami." Prior to that, on U. S. democratic soil, both sides were represented in court proceedings. But, let's don't dwell on Banana Republic politics...because I can't get over what a beautiful smile Ana has. What was Juan thinking when he said the thing he missed most in Miami was his Jeep? His Jeep! Are you telling me he didn't miss ...that smile?
And one more thing {pardon my loquaciousness, but U. S. - Cuban stories are hard to put down, especially when they are true}. Remember I said that Ana's agents right now are negotiating a lucrative movie contract about her life? I'll let you decide who you think should play Juan, Ileana, Fidel, and Jose but I've made up my mind that the only Hollywood actress beautiful enough, Latino enough, talented enough, and audacious enough to play Ana is...we need a drumroll here...Michelle Rodriguez! So let's gets it done: Michelle playing Ana!!
Michelle Rodriguez starring in "The Country That Raped Me!"
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