Columbia International Affairs Online: Policy Briefs

CIAO DATE: 07/2008

Oh, Brother! Another Castro Clings to Power in Cuba

Roger F. Noriega

March 2008

American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research

Abstract

One step ahead of the devil himself, Fidel Castro is proposing to pass the baton to his revolutionary partner and younger brother, Raúl. With characteristic audacity, the old dictator is hoping that he can bamboozle a gullible international community into recognizing such a succession as a fait accompli. Of course, there is no reason that the successor regime will be able to consummate this arrangement as long as the rest of the world gives the welfare of the Cuban people a second thought. Fidel's disintegration makes way for an extraordinarily expectant time in Cuba's history. Men and women of good will on the island may yet snatch their future from a decrepit and discredited regime, and outsiders' only role should be to help them in every way possible. We should bear in mind at this critical hour that one false move--by the United States, in particular--could confer legitimacy on a "new" Cuban dictator and consign 11 million Cubans to prolonged desperation.