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Castro: Never Mr. Nice Guy
On February 20, 2008, because of his health, Fidel Castro resigned as President and Commander in Chief of Cuba and turned over the reigns to his brother Raul.
In recent years Hollywood celebrities and U.S. political figures have traveled to Cuba to visit Fidel Castro and treated him as though he is some heroic figure. Most had glowing words to say about their host. Fidel Castro is a very charismatic individual and his long tenure in office adds to his legend, but Castro is defiantly not a heroic figure, far from it. Now that he has stepped down, and as President Obama and the United States seek better relationships with Cuba, with which I agree, I thought it would be timely if we reviewed some of Castro's real record.
FACT: In an August 8, 1958 speech Castro said "our primary objective is to reestablish democracy." Five months later, on January 1, 1959, he lead the Cuban revolution to victory. Since then he has never relinquished power and has remained in office 49 years. Not a promised democracy but a communist dictatorship.
Castro is not a hero to many of the Cuban people who expected democracy.
FACT: By the end of 1959 virtually all major business was under state control and critical newspapers were silenced. All of the media was eventually controlled by the government, including the internet. Today in order to get on the internet you must get permission from the government.
Castro is not a hero to journalists or the citizens who lost their business.
FACT: In 1961 he declared himself a Marxist Leninist. He purged his military, replacing them with communist militants, and those who complained he jailed, executed, or forced to leave Cuba. They were friends who fought along side him in the revolution. Their crime: they wanted what they fought for, democracy not communism.
Castro is not a hero to many of his compatriots of the Revolution.
FACT: Commandant Huber Motos, who fought in the revolution alongside Castro and even rode into Havana as a hero on a tank, standing with Castro, complained about communism creeping into government and the military, and he resigned. Castro called him a traitor and he was imprisoned for 20 years, sixteen of these years in solitary confinement.
FACT: In July 1961, during the Cold War, the U.S. broke relations with Cuba.
In the early 60s Castro made a deal with the Soviet Union to place nuclear missiles in Cuba aimed at the U.S. Castro then suggested, in a cable to Premier Khrushchev on October 27, 1962, that they launch from Cuba a first nuclear strike. In a letter to Castro, Soviet Premier Khrushchev rejected the idea: "You realize of course where that would have led, rather than a simple strike it would have been the start of a thermonuclear war."
Castro is not a hero to those who remember he wanted to nuke the U.S.
FACT: Castro is the man whose repressive government caused the U.N. Human Rights Commission, along with Amnesty International, from the 1960s into the 21st century to condemn Cuba for "the continuing violation of human rights." In April 1986, "The Tribunal on Cuba" met in Paris and, as reported on April 18 in Le Figaro, "testimony by former Cuban prisoners resembled those made 40 years ago by survivors of the Death Camps."
Castro is not a hero to those mistreated in Cuban prisons.
FACT: Just six years ago Castro arrested 75 human rights activists, journalists and opposition figures and sentenced them to terms ranging from six to 28 years. Last year a free press group, "Reporters without Borders," appealed to Raul Castro to release the 19 reporters in prison since 2003.
Castro is no hero to those unfairly jailed or their families.
FACT: Since Castro's triumph in the revolution, over two million Cubans, many at great risk of life, fled Cuba. Something must be wrong. Some were Cubans whose property had been confiscated, small businessmen whose stores and shops were closed, the very poor dwellers in Havana's squalid inner-city, as well as many poor throughout the country. They were fed up with economic hardship and virtual disappearance of political freedom. That exodus continues today.
Castro is no hero to the millions of loyal Cuban people who had to flee their homeland.
FACT: In the 1970s the U.S. and Cuba decided to try to get along. At a secret meeting in the Hotel Pierre, near LaGuardia Airport in New York, Cuban and American officials tried to work out a rapprochement. In 1975 Secretary of State Henry Kissinger announced the U.S. was ready to "begin a new relationship." The two countries were on the brink of an agreement.
Then Fidel Castro made one of the worse decisions in his life. Just as the normalization of relations between Cuba and the U.S. seemed imminent, Castro decided to rekindle his international ambitions. He faced a choice, intervention with Cuban troops into Angola's civil war, or normalize relations with the United States. Unfortunately he made the wrong choice. With Cuban troops fighting in Angola, President Gerald Ford said Castro's intrusion into Angola precludes any improvement of relations with Cuba.
Castro is no hero to the Cubans who wanted to renew U.S. relations.
FACT: Like an ancient potentate, Castro has passed his power on to his younger brother Raul Castro. Raul was then elected president in a sham election as the only candidate on the ballot. According to CNN, Time and the Wall Street Journal, Raul has a "reputation for ruthlessness." If you think Cuba is going to have a meaningful change with Raul, don't bet on it. Raul has said socialism and communism will remain. Recently it is reported that Cuba was discussing a plan to bring the Russian military back into Cuba. Raul just allowed the Cuban people to own a cell phone. A start, but funny, as most Cubans really can't afford them.
SUMMARY: So, Castro is no hero. The real Fidel Castro lied when he promised democracy, he confiscated businesses large and small, he executed or jailed many of his fellow revolutionaries, he silenced a free press, he rebuked the U.S. when he had a chance at rapprochement, he caused millions of loyal Cubans to leave their homeland and in a secret deal with the Soviet Union, he had nuclear missiles placed in Cuba aimed at the U.S. Then he actually suggested to Khrushchev he wanted to fire them in a preemptive strike. That's right, nuke America. And so as he leaves the world stage and as the U.S. plans for better relations, let's remember what Castro actually did to his country. The more than two million that fled Cuba, they remember. Yes, I know Cuba has a lot of doctors, but the misery he brought to the Cuban people for the last 49 years is the real legacy of Fidel Castro.
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There is only one reason that Fidel Castro came to power: the Eisenhower administration declared an arms embargo on the Batista regime, thereby signalling to Batista and the Cuban people that it had shifted its support to The New York Times' candidate for Cuban leader, the so-called "Jeffersonian democrat."
I wonder how writers choose their topics of the day. That article could have been written about dozens of countries and leaders, including the U.S. And what's the point? Castro was no hero. Fine. So what? Castro is nearly dead, his brother is not far behind, the US embargo has been a failure, the US continues to occupy a part of Cuba where the US practiced torture and illegal confinement precisely to avoid the rule of law, and I don't think anyone in the US is going to be building a monument to Castro any time soon. Time for everyone to move on to more constructive ways.
Castro is a hero to those who have been stomped by the American empire and there's no denying that. We can argue about human rights abuses all we want but our track record in latin america is atrocious. Under the guise of battling communism we've intervened in all but one country in the western hemisphere, we've killed democratically elected leaders and we've unleashed some of the nastiest, most blood thirsty dictators in the history of human kind on our neighbors. To anyone other than a Cuban who left the island in the sixties Castro is a teddy bear compared to the United States. How hypocritical do you have to be to call on Castro's human rights record when this country was running an apartheid regime until the late sixties? Even today we treat our black citizens worse than anything done in Cuba, as innocent until proven guilty doesn't apply if you have dark skin.
Cuba is a totalitarian regime. But how many real democracies do you know in the developing world ? Among communist countries, the Cuban state is one of the least repressive.
Castro built his movement in reaction to the totally corrupt Batista regime. His repression and corruption are lightyears from what Castro did. And he had unconditional support of the USA. Had the USA allowed a democratic opposition in Cuba, there would be no Castrism.
After coming to power, Castro was under massive pressure from the USA, his country was besieged militarily and economically. This put them on the defense.
In spite of this, there are some remarkable achievements that are much more than propaganda rethoric :
The health system is one of the best in the third world, I know it from first hand experience. Particularly impressive is the fact that child mortality is lower than in the USA ( see Wiki).
Food, education are much better distributed than in many other countries. Look at Santo Domingo, Haiti for the difference.
Let's hurry up and end the embargo now. Why can't I go on vacation to Cuba?
No matter what anyone says about this topic, large numbers of people aren't going to believe it.
Just think if Castro hadn't had the US embargo to blame all his failures over the years.
Different points here. About the nukes. Your interpretation is what it is, one interpretation. It is usually admitted that Castro played his cards with the Russians, hoping that with this threat , he will garantee the security of his island against US attacks. He actually won his bet.
Most analysts consider him a socialist-nationalist and his turn toward "communism" was only practical, the country had to survive after the US blockade. The ruin of the Soviet Union had terrific consequences for the Cubans. By the way, I hate when people say Soviet Union, or Cuba, are communists. Their system has nothing to do with communism (looks more like fascism) and it is a disgrace to see words being used that way.
Finally, Castro, in hist last forty years, is partly the result of the multiple plots to assassinate him, many plots coming from the Cuban-Americans. I am not saying he is a good guy, I am just saying that's what you get when you have an authoritarian leader who turns paranoid.
Castro's crimes, real or imagined, pale in comparison with not only the US government's but many of our allies. Let me give you just one case in point. In Brazil, street children and others are summarily executed in the hundreds and perhaps even thousands every year by on and off duty policemen. This has been going on for years. If you don't believe, use the Google. I don't recall reading about the Cuban government doing anything even remotely similar to that to its own citizens, and I read a lot. In any case, if the Cuban people were that unhappy with the Castro regime it is their business to change that, not ours.
Great post! It's really funny that Khrushchev was the "voice of reason" compared to Fidel.
I am always astounded by the attitude many who consider themselves humanitarians have towards Fidel Castro...
It's a fantasy...
Thomas Jefferson put it best for me...when he said...
"I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility for every tyranny over the mind of man...!"
That goes for the Unitary Executive here and the Castro brothers alike..!
That's the problem with left-wing/socialism/political-correctness. Hostility is never allowed, even against something that is wrong. We are told to embrace all differences because diversity is everything and morals are all relative.
Nonsense, of course, and it will wreck our civilization. But socialism is kindness and who are we to let our "freedoms" and "rights" stand in the way of socialism?
As you see here, a conservative will never actually debate a liberal:
First they build a straw-man caricature of a liberal -
"We are told to embrace all differences because diversity is everything and morals are all relative"
- and then proceed to tear apart their own creation.
American exceptionalism at its best. If you want to talk about morals then look at how we've behaved around the world for the past fifty years and then talk about how morals are relative. You're probably one of the retards that thought we'd be greeted in the streets when we invaded Iraq right?
You seem to have understood the quote as if it read "I have sworn upon the alter of God, eternal hostility for every tyrant over man."
This quote was from Jefferson's letter on the subject of Christianity, "I promised you a letter on Christianity, which I have not forgotten." addressed to Benjamin Rush, September 23, 1800.
Jefferson was not speaking of tyrants over man, but speaking of religious tyranny over the mind of man, particularly Christian religious tyranny, particularly but not only of the "Episcopalians and Congregationalists", and that Jefferson would not bow to their "lying pamphlets against me, forging conversations for me with Mazzei, Bishop Madison,&c., which are absolute falsehoods without a circumstance of truth to rest on."
To further push the point, Jefferson was careful to note that these "genus irritabile vatum" had nothing else to fear except his opposition to tyranny of the mind, he was not going after the tyrants themselves.
Castro is no hero, but it's time to focus on freedom for the Cuban people rather than our well deserved anger toward the Castro brothers. http://talkingcuba.wordpress.com/
EXCELLENT ARTICLE, SHOULD BE MANDATORY READING!
It will be fun watching the HP membership excuse this brutal dictator, condemn the United States, and laud the free education, housing and medical care the Cuban people "enjoy." Remember, Fidel gave the Cubans what everyone would give their dog: 1) Housing, 2) Education (training), and 3) Medical Care (veternarian).
Wow, some of the things you have listed are not given to over 50 million Americans. Maybe you should take out health care. I have seen to many families go bankrupt in this country due to medical expenses.
Castro destroyed Cuba. The once world class city of Havana is in ruin. Communism should not be rewarded with free US taxpayer guaranteed credit. Negotiate yes, but with democracy as the goal. Baby steps.
Who is United States to dictate what type of government a country select?
The Cuban people are the one paying the price the differences of two government.
For over 200 years the United States has commited or been party to some of the greatest acts of horror known to mankind. The genocide of the native Amricans, Slavery of the African, wars of aggression such as Vietnam, Iraq and Cambodia.
So who are we to throw stones at Cuba?
They have committed many errors over the years, who has not? But they have also tried to better the lot of the populace a well.
I have to wonder just how democratic our country would be if it were the recipient of a 40 year trade embargo.
You want to find monsters in this world, easy, look to N. Korea, China, the Sudan.
But when it comes to Fidel, eeeh, not so much.
You history is, let's say, "selective." The United States has built the most lasting free and democratic society giving millions of people opportunity to build a standard of living unmatched by any other country. Only the tolerant people of the U.S. would elect a Black President when just 13% of the population is black or have 9% of elected officials be Jewish when just 2% of the U.S. population is Jewish. We failed to establish a democracy in Vietnam because we lost our will, our hearts were in the right place though. Just ask the over 1 million boat people who left Vietnam before the Communists killed an estimated million people. And you blame the U.S. for the Communist genocide of Pol Pot in Cambodia------you are one skewed individual. After liberating millions of Eastern Europeans from the grip of the Soviet Union and after liberating the Iraqis from Saddam Hussain and liberating millions from Nazism (at a cost of over 500,000 young men), I must say I am proud of my country and can see the difference between U.S. liberty and the totalitarian dungeon of Castro's vile regime.
Your answer is very selective,no Cuban official argument on national the
legality of torture or effectiveness .
Your answer is very selective,no Cuban official argument on national TV
the legality of torture or effectiveness .
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