A Military Option In Cuba's Future?

The Island Doesn't Rule It Out
Updated: Friday, June 19th, 2015

         The enigmatic island of Cuba, day by day, is opening up fully to the outside world. The very influential youth newspaper -- Juventud Rebelde -- recently conducted an island-wide survey of young adults and discovered that their prime desire was to have access to the Internet. Since then the Cuban government has entertained suggestions from Goggle and Twitter executives. And Thursday's Juventud Rebelde edition reported that three dozen WI-FI spots are opening around the island this week. Also, the fees for online access have been drastically reduced. Just over one million of Cuba's 11.2 million citizens have Smart Phones and that number is increasing sharply in line with the increased Internet access.

        This AP/Desmond Boylan photo shows Adonis Ortiz speaking on his phone in Cuba to his father in the United States. Young Cubans like Adonis have told the Cuban government they want more access to Smart Phones and the Internet. And by all accounts from the island, the government is responding positively. 

       Cristina Escobar personifies the emerging influence of Cuba's young adults. The 26-year-old Cristina is the island's most ubiquitous television personality and top journalist. Extremely photogenic and telegenic, she stunned Americans when she traveled to Washington to cover the last diplomatic session featuring Cuba's Josefina Vidal and America's Roberta Jacobson. Well educated and fluent in English as well as Spanish, Cristina's journalistic skills blew Washington journalists away, as did her pro-Cuban speeches around Washington when she emphasized this point: "My personal mission to the United States is to point out that the lies the U. S. media tells about Cuba hurts everyday Cubans on the island most of all." Cristina praised President Barack Obama this week for "having the courage to stand up to the Cuban-American war-mongers in Miami and Washington. They are still there but the American President, by just not quivering before them, has allowed Cuba to open up more and, as we have reported this week, begin providing full Internet access to our people on the island. A few powerful Miami Cubans will continue to try to block any positive on the island, but at least President Obama has provided us an opening to come in out of the cold, so to speak." In Cuba when Cristina Escobar speaks, Cubans listen...especially young Cubans. At the moment, Cristina has far more influence on the island than what she calls "the well-funded Miami Cubans."

         The Cuban Revolution on January 1-1959 shocked the world by becoming the first grounds-root revolution to overthrow a U.S.-backed dictator, in this case the brutal and thieving Batista-Mafia regime.

         The chronology of the Cuban Revolution from 1952 till 1959 is now engraved on the pantheon of history. After the revolutionary victory on Januaary 1-1959, the Batista-Mafia leaders fled back to their sanctuaries, especially South Florida. The most vehement of the anti-Castro zealots, still with the backing of the U. S. government, became the leaders of what essentially was the very belligerent Cuban government-in-exile. The most radical among them -- including Jorge Mas Canosa and Luis Posada Carriles -- were quickly sent to Fort Benning in Georgia to attend the Army School of the Americas, which Americans knew nothing about, at least till it was revealed decades later during the Clinton administration. The Army School served as a training ground for soldiers from U.S.-backed dictatorships who were then sent back home to prop up those dictators in the Caribbean or Latin America. After the Cuban Revolution, the Cuban exiles at Fort Benning were trained to recapture Cuba and eliminate Fidel Castro and other revolutionary leaders. In a famous New York Times interview conducted by Ann Louise Bardach, Luis Posada Carriles thanked U. S. taxpayers and the very wealthy Mas Canosa for supporting his anti-Castro endeavors. Castro survived a myriad of assassination attempts but the prime thrust of the Fort Benning operation from 1959 till 1961 was to prepare for a military attack designed to recapture Cuba, taking full advantage of U.S.-backed anti-Castro dictators such as Trujillo in the Dominion Republic and Somoza in Nicaragua. The odds, as you may imagine, were stacked very high against Castro and Cuba in the imperialist early 1960s.

          In 1960 the neophyte John F. Kennedy administration inherited a military plan from the outgoing Eisenhower administration to launch a military attack to regain control of Cuba. The CIA famously gave Kennedy two assurances: {1} Fidel Castro would flee to his getaway airplane as soon as he heard U. S. bombers overhead; and {2} the Cubans on the island, once the attack began, would themselves rise up against Castro. With those assurances, Kennedy signed off on the Bay of Pigs shenanigans but the new President insisted on blatantly lying to the American people about the U. S. support of the cowardly attack.

         As it turned out, Fidel Castro, unlike Batista and his cronies, didn't have a "getaway airplane," so he raced to the front-lines at the Bay of Pigs to defend Cuba. The attack started on April 17, 1961, when 8 U. S. bombers left Nicaragua, which was then led by U.S.-backed dictator Somoza, to destroy Cuba's airfields. Another U. S. bomber was circling Havana for the sole purpose of bombing any residence Castro was believed to be residing. But the CIA never pinpointed which residence. When the first bombs fell on Havana's Camp Colombia airfield, Fidel happened to be at Celia Sanchez' Havana apartment, which was his normal practice. While the CIA didn't figure that out, two notable journalists -- Herbert L. Mathews of the New York Times and Cuba's Carlos Franqui -- guessed correctly and both telephoned the apartment and talked with both Fidel and Celia. Still tied to his lie about U. S. involvement, Kennedy twiddled his thumbs nervously in the Oval Office while Fidel raced to the Bay of Pigs, where he and Celia had earlier visited because they anticipated, perhaps with a pinpoint warning, that the impending ground attack would logically take place at the Bay of Pigs. Within 72 hours, Fidel's rebels had shocked the world a second time with its easy victory at the Bay of Pigs. The CIA-and-U.S.-taxpayer-trained Cuban exiles in Brigade 2506 were wiped out or captured. Kennedy and Castro later agreed to return the prisoners {above} to the U. S. in exchange for $53 million, mostly paid in medical supplies and boxes of Gerber Baby Food. A little deeper into his presidency, Kennedy famously bellowed to his aides, "I wish I could blow the CIA to smithereens." In other words, before his assassination and what would have been his easy reelection, President Kennedy had rebounded from the Republican plans that he had inherited, which was "blow Cuba to smithereens." 

         At 12:30 P. M. on Friday, November 22, 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. Prior to his trip to Dallas, Kennedy had told Pierre Salinger and other key aides that his "top priority" upon his return to Washington was to "normalize relations"  with Cuba. To this day it is not known how, or if, that pledge played a role in the assassination in Dallas but it is well known that Kennedy's plans to normalize relations with Cuba resulted in him being targeted anew by elements who had blamed the young and popular President for the Bay of Pigs debacle. From start to finish, Kennedy's presidency tightly revolved around the island of Cuba, from the inheritance of the 1961 Bay of Pigs plans, to the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, to the 1963 third year of his brief presidency when he felt strong enough to normalize relations with Cuba. The Kennedy saga is proof that America, Cuba, and the world would be better off if the lush island was not so mightily coveted by everyone from the Dulles brothers in the 1950s to the Diaz-Balart brothers in 2015. Kennedy once told Salinger: "What makes Cuba beautiful also makes it vulnerable, like a beautiful woman targeted by fiends. She never has time to enjoy the good life, la dolce vita, that's all around her." 

 This Wikipedia map delineates the location of the Bay of Pigs attack.

         This Wikipedia photo shows the Bay of Pigs Memorial today in Miami's Little Havana neighborhood. From 1961 until today, the Bay of Pigs remains the only U.S./Cuban-exile military attack designed to recapture Cuba. However, Little Havana's tight alliances with the Bush dynasty has resulted in Little Havana's dictation of America's Cuban policy in the U. S. Congress since the 1980s. That came about when the Bush-anointed Jorge Mas Canosa became the singular head of the Cuban government-in-exile. And then, in 1989, Havana-born Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Miami rode her Bush connections to become the first in a ever-growing line of anti-Castro zealots in Miami reaching the hallowed halls of the U. S. Congress. Since 1961 there have been no U.S.-backed military attacks on Cuba but there have been numerous U.S.-tolerated terrorists acts against the island, most notably the Oct. 6-1976 bombing of the civilian plane Cubana Flight 455. Since the 1960s, Democratic administrations -- Kennedy, Carter, Clinton, and Obama -- have tried but failed to normalize relations with Cuba. In all such attempts, the Little Havana stranglehold on the U. S. Congress has simply been too much to overcome. Like Presidents Kennedy, Carter, and Clinton, Mr. Obama will replicate those earlier failures. The Bay of Pigs Memorial in Little Havana, of course, has different connotations than the plethora of Bay of Pigs Memorials in Cuba, signifying the wide chasms between the two nations as well as the vast 90-miles of sea separating the two neighbors.  

For example......................

          ......................these three Miami-based Cuban-Americans in the U. S. Congress have far more influence on America's Cuban policy than President Obama. That's Mario Diaz-Balart on the left flanked on his left by Marco Rubio and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. All are entrenched anti-Castro members of the Congress although Rubio is relinquishing his first-term Senate seat to make a serious bid for the U. S. Presidency. The Havana-born Ros-Lehtinen has been entrenched in the U. S. Congress from Miami since 1989 when Jeb Bush was her Campaign Manager. Today the Little Havana and Republican control of the U. S. Congress on all things Cuban will easily over-rule yet another Democratic President, Barack Obama.

        Roll Call, one of the most popular propaganda sheets masquerading as journalism in Washington, this week highlighted a fawning tribute to Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart. The propaganda piece, written by Emma Dumain, lauded Diaz-Balart, claiming he "has spoken out for years against corruption and human-rights abuses in Cuba." Sure he has. In Miami since 1959 that is a sure way to get rich and powerful...and all the way to Washington, either in the U. S. Congress or, soon, the White House. Of course, neither the Roll Call or any of the other not-so-subtle propaganda sheets will ever mention that Mario's father, Rafael Diaz-Balart, was one of the most powerful Ministers in the Batista dictatorship and one of the richest and most powerful anti-Castro zealots in Miami. Thus, mouthpieces like Roll Call and even the intimidated mainstream U. S. media are not about to question the second generation of Miami Diaz-Balarts -- four rich and powerful sons of Rafael -- when they assault Cuba for "corruption and human-rights abuses." Of course, the inference is that the Batista-Mafia rule of Cuba was strictly by Mother Teresa-types who showered nothing but love, affection, and generous welfare on the Cuban people from 1952 till 1959 and then, once chased to Miami, have tried their best to do the same to the unfortunate Cubans still on the island. When Miami's top Cuban-American newsman, Emilio Milian, objected to that premise, he was car-bombed. When the Miami Herald's top columnist, Jim DeFede, loudly excoriated Miami's members of the U. S. Congress -- namely the Diaz-Balarts and Ros-Lehtinen -- for what DeFede deemed their shameful support of Cuban terrorists in Miami, DeFede was fired. American citizens, over time, have been strongly advised to support the Diaz-Balarts and ignore brave, patriotic people like Emilio Milian, Jim DeFede, etc., and now brave, patriotic members of Congress such as Kathy Castor of Tampa, Florida, and Jeff Flake of Arizona. For sure, it is healthier and more politically correct to side with the Diaz-Balarts, not Congresswoman Castor or Senator Flake. As far as the six U. S. networks are concerned, the Diaz-Balarts, Rubio, etc., can have unlimited airtime to vilify Cuba and glorify Batista. {Jose Diaz-Balart, Mario's brother, has his own one-hour program at 9:00 A. M. each day on MSNBC in case you want a big dose of propaganda} On the other hand, those same networks are devoted to the principle that Americans should not ever hear the Cuban viewpoints of unbiased members of Congress, like Florida's Kathy Castor and Arizona's Jeff Flake. 

         It is interesting to note, as the money-crazed presidential campaign determines the next President beginning in January of 2017, how the Bush dynasty's Cuban connections play out. Jeb Bush, because of his name and the billions of dollars that back it up, is the Republican favorite. But his prime challenger is the young Senator Marco Rubio, a protege of both Jeb Bush and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the first Cuban-American to make it to Congress way back in 1989 when Jeb was her Campaign Manager in his bid to successfully ingratiate himself with the Cubans in Little Havana, still the thrust of his political power. In the heated presidential race, Ros-Lehtinen and others like her in Little Havana would be expected to support one of their own -- Senator Rubio. But that's not the case. The Bush alliance with the Cuban-American power-brokers favors Jeb over Marco. Despite that, when the dust settles, Rubio will deny Jeb what he considers his turn to be the next Bush in the White House. And even more flummoxing and interesting.....

           .............Josefina Vidal, Cuba's U. S. expert and the island's prime decision-maker on all things American, prefers Marco Rubio over Jeb Bush as the next President of the U. S. Moreover, after pushing past Jeb, Vidal believes Rubio will upend Democratic challenger Hillary Clinton, largely because of Clinton's ties to Wall Street and foreign money associated with the billionaire Clinton Foundation. And beyond all that, Vidal believes -- in the first post-Obama Republican administration -- the "big military option will be on the table." She believes the preamble to that, to dupe easily duped Americans, will be a provocation that will force Cuba to either capitulate or to react. "We will not capitulate," she says, "so draw your own conclusions regarding the response to our reaction." Her conclusion seems obvious: The pre-text for military action can be easily provoked because there is nothing regarding Cuba Americans will oppose. How nice. Vidal remembers that media battle-cry in Miami after the demise of Cubana Flight 455: "It's the biggest blow yet against Castro!" If that didn't solicit a whimper from Americans, she surmises, what will?

         If you doubt Josefina Vidal's American expertise from her vantage point in Havana, I suggest you study Andy Gomez's Cuban expertise from his base in Miami. Gomez has a family vendetta against Fidel Castro. That qualities him to be USA Today's Cuban expert in Miami. His column Wednesday -- June 17th -- was entitled "Too Early To Judge Obama's Cuba Plan." Is that because Gomez anticipates a military option post-Obama? Gomez wrote: "Any strategy designed to topple or significantly change a government system that doesn't include military intervention is going to take time. Especially in Cuba. Fidel Castro and his brother Raul have not ruled for 56 years by pure luck." The Castro brothers, both deep into their 80s, will soon be replaced by younger non-Castros like Miguel Diaz-Canel and Josefina Vidal. It appears that Little Havana in Miami does not want that transition to take place, believing it would deny them their well-grafted anti-Castro venom. Vilifying Diaz-Canel and Vidal to justify another half-century of the embargo might be too much for even proselytized Americans to take. So, before the post-Castro transition takes place, is a military option on the table if, and when, either Rubio or Bush succeeds Obama as Commander in Chief? Vidal, the Cuban expert on all things American, believes so. And Gomez, USA Today's expert on all things Cuban, used the phrase "military intervention" to suggest that anything else "is going to take time." As I read that summation from Andy Gomez this week, I was reminded that the Little Havana hard-liners have ample reason to believe that, regardless of what they do in regards to Cuba, the American people will, as always, be compliant. In any case, on a week in June of 2015 when Josefina Vidal in Havana and Andy Gomez in Miami both mention a post-Obama "military" option, that one-word nexus across the 90 miles of the Florida Straits should be taken seriously. Vidal: "Military option." Gomez: "Military intervention." One seems to dread it; the other seems to welcome it. Americans: They don't seem to care.

           Cuba, which keeps a sharp eye on the Miami media, is reacting to what it feels are unjustified assaults on Alejandro Castro Espin, the 49-year-old son of Cuban President Raul Castro and revolutionary icon Vilma Espin. Cuba believes the anti-Castro contingent in Miami is targeting Alejandro to belittle the fact that Raul Castro has already designated 55-year-old Miguel Diaz-Canel the next Cuban leader. Alejandro is a highly educated Colonel in Cuba's Interior Ministry and he is a key adviser to his father. But he says that he, his father, and his uncle Fidel "all agree there will not be a Castro monarchy because that would go against the revolution, which we feel was justified and remain proud of." Alejandro was recently interviewed by Mega TV in Greece. He is the only son of Raul Castro and Vilma Espin, who died of cancer in 2007. But he has three sisters -- Deborah, Mariela, and Nilsa. Of the four siblings, Mariela is the best known but Deborah is the most powerful. The word out of Miami this week is that Alejandro is being "groomed" as the next Cuban leader. "That's the absolute last thing I'm being groomed for," Alejandro said in Greece. 

         President Obama's efforts to normalize relations will Cuba have resulted in some successes and will have some more...even the opening of embassies in the capitals for the first time in 54 years. But like the other Democratic Presidents since 1963 -- Kennedy, Carter, and Clinton -- Obama's efforts will fail for the reasons mentioned in assessing the Vidal and Gomez assessments. U. S. failure regarding Cuba is endemic, a failure that democracy and its taxpayers pay a steep price in order to make it perpetual. 

         While the U. S. democracy -- backed by the strongest economy and military in the world -- remains strong, that is not the case when it comes to Cuba. In his Cuban venture, Mr. Obama has the majority support of Americans, Cuban-Americans, the Caribbean, Latin America, and the world. But that's not nearly enough. Right-wingers embedded high-up in the U. S. government -- such as the Dulles brothers in the 1950s and the leaders of the current Republican domination of the U. S. Congress -- can easily thwart the democratic ideals of any Democratic President when it comes to Cuba. Thus, President Obama is no match for the hard-line Cuban-exile core in Miami that, since its 1980s empowerment by the Bush dynasty, has readily dictated Cuban policy in the U. S. Congress by easily aligning with the requisite number of right-wing sycophants -- from Roberto Torricelli to Jesse Helms to John Boehner. Yes, America, the Cuban Revolution says a lot more about America than it says about Cuba. It has been that way for a long time.

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