Guest AuthorFidel Castro was a robust and menacing 33 when he and a band of revolutionaries toppled Cuba’s dictator of the moment, Fulgencio Batista. For a short time the U.S. foreign policy establishment had high hopes this would be a regime change worth embracing.
It was not to be. Castro, it became clear, was a Communist, and with the Cold War at its most frigid, nothing was more threatening than a Communist at the back door. Concern matured into fear and then into paranoia.
The U.S. sponsored the Bay of Pigs invasion, a foreign policy blunder that went tragically wrong, would influence the relationship between the two countries for – who knew – decades. The Cuban missile fiasco merely sealed the deal. Fidel Castro was a pariah not to be trusted, not even to be spoken to.
With the arrival of massive numbers of Cuban immigrants who soon became voters, hardened anti-Castro policy became calcified. What was once a well-founded fear became an irrational hysteria. The U.S. relationship with Cuba was like no other on the planet. No matter the changes in reality, the policy remained as it was in 1961.
Nixon went to China. The Soviet Union fell. The Cold War ended. Cuba remained the pariah. We forgave Vietnam even after losing 57,000 American troops. We forgave Cambodia. We did business with China, courted it even. We see North Korea and Iran as dangerous threats but we talk to them.
Cuba is different. China’s dismal human rights record is excusable. Cuba’s is not. Communists rule Vietnam with a death grip, but we trade with it. Yet we can’t sell a Coke to Cuba.
Why? Why does the United States isolate this small country that hasn’t been a threat – if it ever was one – in 20 years? The answer lies in the way politics works in America. Small pressure groups have influence beyond their size. The Cuban-American voting bloc is significant in Miami but not even on the radar screen in the nation.
A significant majority of Americans care not at all about Cuba and the rest would welcome a change in policy. Still, discussion of normalizing relations with Cuba is politically radioactive. Speak but the word and dire consequences follow. Or so it is believed. In truth any political leader north of Palm Beach could launch a debate of the issue with impunity. And isn’t it time for such a debate to commence?
America has a long history of befriending foes. Remember England? Mexico? Japan? Germany? Italy? Vietnam? Nicaragua? Iraq?
So, isn’t it time – as the revolutionary turns 87 and fades ever deeper into insignificance – to stop pretending that Cuba is a threat? Isn’t it time to admit our Cuban policy is not just an oddity but an absurdity? Isn’t it time to tell our Cuban-American friends that it’s time to move on?
