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Foreign Policy
Winter 1998–99
Cuba’s Long-Distance Civil War
President Fidel Castro’s triumph in the Cuban Revolution ended a hot local conflict, but it also began a colder long-distance confrontation between Cubans who lost their assets and social positions and those who took them over.
The losers joined forces with the United States, attempting military action before settling on the trade embargo as their weapon of choice. In the early years, the Cuban exile community was too weak to sway the U.S. political process, and U.S. corporate interests and geopolitical concerns took precedence over civil confrontation. But over time, as the exiles became U.S. citizens and learned how to use their new country’s political system, their influence has expanded dramatically. The Cuban American National Foundation (CANF), founded in 1981 by the charismatic Jorge Mas Canosa, has built a strong lobby that has worked to tighten the embargo on Cuba. Together with groups such as the Institute of Democracy in Cuba and former major property holders in Cuba such as the National Association of Sugar Mill Owners of Cuba and the Bacardi rum company, CANF played a major role in drafting punitive legislation such as the 1996 Helms-Burton law. Those individuals who took over farmland, real estate, and productive assets in Cuba needed a political system that would prevent the losers, who were supported by an awesome geopolitical player, from regaining power. In addition to the backing of the Soviet Union, the winners’ weapon of choice was an “internal” embargo that has kept Castro in place but constrained political and economic freedom. Today, the Cuban government still sees private ownership, freedom of the press, the multiparty system, and even the growing number of self-employed Cubans as vehicles that will allow wealthy enemies in Florida to regain economic power and buy electoral support.
As with many wars, chief among the casualties have been ordinary civilians. Sanctions have retarded Cuba’s development and hurt families. Harsh efforts by Cuban authorities to keep their external enemies at bay have ruined lives and deterred Cuba from putting its resources to better use. On the eve of the revolution, Cuba enjoyed one of the highest standards of living in Latin America, ranking first in the per capita availability of telephones, newspapers, and private automobiles; second in per capita income (after Venezuela); and third in average food intake (after Argentina and Uruguay). It now lags behind most of the region in all these areas.
The long-distance civil war is not over, but its intensity seems to be diminishing. Disillusioned by the failure of the U.S. embargo to remove Castro from power, the American foreign-policy and business establishments increasingly advocate a more open U.S. policy toward Cuba-witness the proposal made in October 1998 by a group of Republican and Democratic senators, with the endorsement of three former secretaries of state, to initiate the first comprehensive review of U.S. policy on Cuba since 1959. Demographic changes within the Cuban exile community are tipping the balance of power away from those who seek to regain their properties toward more recent arrivals who have closer ties to their families in Cuba. Finally, in Cuba itself, a taste of capitalism and freedom has created a constituency for further liberalization.
—FP