Dump the Cuban Embargo

I'm in the U.S. Airways Shuttle Terminal at La Guardia. It's a late night in October, and I run into a senior economic official from the Clinton administration. We catch up on friends, and I tell him that I'm working on a column about the U.S. economic embargo against Cuba and what a disaster it's been -- for Cuba and for the United States. The official says this to me: "If someone had told supporters of the embargo that after nearly 50 years, the Soviet Union would be gone; Communism would be gone from Eastern Europe; China, while Communist-controlled, would have 300 McDonald's and thriving capitalism; that Cuba would be one of the only Marxist governments left; and, oh, that Castro would still be alive, they might have thought differently."

The American embargo of Cuba is one of those things that most of the political elite in Washington privately acknowledge as a failure. Publicly, they defend it because of fears that the Cuban American community, famously concentrated in presidentially pivotal Florida, will beat the tar out of them. In October, President Bush reiterated his commitment to it in a speech to Cuban dissidents, and it's no wonder that none of the leading presidential candidates has called for abolishing the embargo, initiated in 1960 as Fidel Castro's regime began confiscating U.S. assets. During the past 47 years, the embargo has evolved into a slew of restrictions on travel and trade, all designed to bring down Castro. And it's worked so well!

It's time to end the embargo -- unilaterally and completely. The policy has been useless as a tool for cudgeling Castro, and it is hindering opportunities for American industries from travel to banking to agriculture, which is why there's no shortage of U.S. business groups lobbying to ease it. Far from hurting the deplorable Communist regime, the embargo has only given Castro an excuse to rail against Uncle Sam, both to his own people and to the world. Every year, Cuba asks the United Nations for a vote lifting the embargo. What happens? We usually end up with a couple of superpowers like Palau and the Marshall Islands standing with us. Last year, the vote was 183 to 4. The embargo makes us look like an arrogant bully.

Sure, in the early days of the cold war, we persuaded other countries to help us isolate Castro by severing trade ties with him. But in the ensuing years, they've all fallen away. That's why you can buy and smoke a fine Habana Cohiba pretty much anywhere but in the U.S.  sanctions are hard enough to enforce when the world agrees on them, as was the case with Saddam Hussein's Iraq. With Cuba, it's an embargo of one, which is like a lone guy in Times Square on New Year's Eve grumpily refusing to put on a party hat.

While we grouse, the world sells. Italian telecoms, French hotels, and Korean automakers are more than happy to trade with an island 90 miles off our shores. Of course, Cuba is not a huge market: The island is the size of Pennsylvania, but its population is only 11 million and its G.D.P. a mere $46 billion. By comparison, Vietnam, the last Communist country with which we ended a dubious embargo, is 85 million strong, with a G.D.P. of $262 billion. Selling to Cuba wouldn't slash our trade deficit, but it wouldn't hurt us either.

Aside from hindering American business, the policy also keeps us from having any political influence over the country, says my old friend Julia Sweig, who is the foremost Cuba expert at the Council on Foreign Relations. She's been to Cuba nearly 30 times and has escorted the likes of the Blackstone Group's Pete Peterson to meet with Castro. Reading her work and talking with her shaped my thinking for this piece. "We're shooting ourselves in the foot," she says near her Dupont Circle office.

Read more here.

Comments

[tahoeprogressive]

Why do the Cuban Americans really want the embargo to remain? Do they hate Castro that much or do they like the idea of sending $100 bills to relatives still on the island, allowing them to live a wonderfull lifestyle compared to those who don't have relatives in Florida?
It's long past time to lift the embargo. I was on a tour in Turkey last fall and my guide thought it was crazy that I couldn't legally travel to Cuba.
The US government has set up a program where they can take all my assets should I attempt to enter Cuba as a tourist. According to the law, there is no legal recourse to my country taking everything I have, just because I want to see the world. This policy penalizes the Cuban people as much as me.

[Novista]

JFK never had a problem getting Cuban cigars ...

Idle thought department: if the fall of the Batista thogocracy had played out differently, I wonder how the Miami patriots would have run Cuba?

[FearlessFreep]

Ever notice how human-rights violations only matter when they're committed by Washington's enemies?

[prado]

Getting rid of the embargo without restoring Cuba's sugar import quota to the United States will be meaningless. Access to the U.S. market and investment in the island's sugar sector will be a major driver (if not the largest) of a "free" Cuban economy. It will be interesting if a Democratic president and the Democratic congressional leadership will allow this if ag interests (sugar beet and cane) will win out and continue to keep Cuban sugar from entering the United States.

[ponderman]

I'd just like to be able to buy a good Cuban cigar.

[cheerleaderBush]

Another example of neurotic US foreign policy - just because it hasn't worked for 47 years, doesn't mean we can't keep trying.

The US taxpayer and US military has learned and will continue to learn a similar lesson in Iraq.

[yowza1]

American pols have been afraid that they will be assassinated by those anti Castro whiners who lost all their shit when Castro took over. That is why they don't lift the embargo. To a man (woman). That is how it has been ever since Kennedy got it.

[RhondaSTL]

Nothing against the Cuban-American community, I understand (as much as I can as a non-Cuban) their strong emotion against Castro. However, American policy on Cuba - United States relations shouldn't be based on what only that portion of Americans believe. The issue affects all of us, granted in different degrees. The policy needs serious, calm-headed review.

[rixhex56]

I think 47 years is fairly good review. IT ISN'T WORKING --- GET RID OF IT.

[elkabong]

Shouldn't it be easier now that "The Red Menace" has been supplanted by "The Islamofascist" as the Authoritarian's' weapon of choice against the nterests of the electorate (some Cuban expats not withstanding)?

[ICUP]

So Stalin's purges, Mao's Cultural Revolution, and Pol Pot's genocide were all created by the "Authoritarian" to keep the American people scared? Guess all those people are happy to be no longer dead.

[elkabong]

Not created, just used. We're doing a heck of a lot of business with communist China, in case you hadn't noticed.

[MsLiz]

I wish the Cuban-American community in Florida would decide which country they love, and stick with it. Do they plan to return to Cuba someday? Do they think they will get their confiscated property back? Hey, I am not ever going to run for office in Florida, I can ask these questions.

[ICUP]

Would you ask the same question of Jews who support Israel, Irish who support Republican Ireland, and Mexicans who send remittances to Mexico?

While I disagree with the Cuabn-Americans stance on Castro and Cuba, I do not see how you can call them out on dual loyalties when many other ethnicites hold similar views.

[pizzmoe]

The Cuban embargo was almost as successful as the
War on Drugs!

[desmirl]

The embargo is just another example of the great thinking that emerges from Washington, D.C. Things like the Vietnam War, the War on Drugs, the War on Poverty, our involvement with Iraq, our attempt to isolate Iran. The rest of the world is laughing at us while they make money and we grumble about not having dependable allies. Bottom line, no one likes hanging around with a failure.

[WorkingClass]

Anybody can say I hate you. But to say I will hate you for ever and then do it - thats the test of a real hater. Castro refused to be our bitch. So we said - ok fucker, I hate you for ever.

[ICUP]

If Obama manages to win in November, then I think it's the best chance for the lifting of the embargo. The Republicans are too wedded to the Cuban-American fringe and the Clintons did nothing to better relations outside of the Gonzalez return.

[repearwo]

Don't hold your breath. To win the Presidency you almost have to win Florida. To win Florida you have to satify the Anti-Castro element in Florida. They will never relent until they are restored in Cuba as the oppressive oligarcy that they once were. No sure that the Cuban People would be real happy about that.

[maddogbitesback]

The embargo makes us look like an arrogant bully.

Guess what? The United States is an arrogant bully. Hopefully it will be a bit more sensible and embrace trade and diplomacy rather than bullying.