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CUBA, CASTRO, and the UNITED STATES
or
How One Man With A Cigar
Dominated American Foreign Policy
In 1959, a rebel, Fidel Castro, overthrew the reign of
Fulgencia Batista in Cuba; a small island 90 miles off the
Florida coast. There have been many coups and changes of
government in the world since then. Few if any have had the
effect on Americans and American foreign policy as this one.
In 1952, Sergeant Fulgencia Batista staged a successful
bloodless coup in Cuba .
Batista never really had any cooperation and rarely
garnered much support. His reign was marked by continual
dissension.
After waiting to see if Batista would be seriously opposed,
Washington recognized his government. Batista had already
broken ties with the Soviet Union and became an ally to the
U.S. throughout the cold war. He was continually friendly and
helpful to American business interest. But he failed to bring
democracy to Cuba or secure the broad popular support that
might have legitimized his rape of the 1940 Constitution.
As the people of Cuba grew increasingly dissatisfied with
his gangster style politics, the tiny rebellions that had
sprouted began to grow. Meanwhile the U.S. government was
aware of and shared the distaste for a regime increasingly
nauseating to most public opinion. It became clear that Batista
regime was an odious type of government. It killed its own
citizens, it stifled dissent. (1)
At this time Fidel Castro appeared as leader of the growing
rebellion. Educated in America he was a proponent of the
Marxist-Leninist philosophy. He conducted a brilliant guerilla
campaign from the hills of Cuba against Batista. On January
1959, he prevailed and overthrew the Batista government.
Castro promised to restore democracy in Cuba, a feat
Batista had failed to accomplish. This promise was looked
upon benevolently but watchfully by Washington. Castro was
believed to be too much in the hands of the people to stretch
the rules of politics very far. The U.S. government supported
Castro's coup. It professed to not know about Castro's
Communist leanings. Perhaps this was due to the ramifications
of Senator Joe McCarty's discredited anti-Communist diatribes.
It seemed as if the reciprocal economic interests of the
U.S. and Cuba would exert a stabilizing effect on Cuban
politics. Cuba had been economically bound to find a market for
its #1 crop, sugar. The U.S. had been buying it at prices much
higher than market price. For this it received a guaranteed
flow of sugar. (2)
Early on however developments clouded the hope for peaceful
relations. According to American Ambassador to Cuba, Phillip
Bonsal, "From the very beginning of his rule Castro and his
sycophants bitterly and sweepingly attacked the relations of
the United States government with Batista and his regime".(3)
He accused us of supplying arms to Batista to help overthrow
Castro's revolution and of harboring war criminals for a
resurgence effort against him. For the most part these were
not true: the U.S. put a trade embargo on Batista in 1957
stopping the U.S. shipment of arms to Cuba. (4) However, his
last accusation seems to have been prescient.
With the advent of Castro the history of U.S.- Cuban
relations was subjected to a revision of an intensity and
cynicism which left earlier efforts in the shade. This
downfall took two roads in the eyes of Washington: Castro's
incessant campaign of slander against the U.S. and Castro's
wholesale nationalization of American properties.
These actions and the U.S. reaction to them set the stage
for what was to become the Bay of Pigs fiasco and the end of
U.S.- Cuban relations.
Castro promised the Cuban people that he would bring land
reform to Cuba. When he took power, the bulk of the nations
wealth and land was in the hands of a small minority. The huge
plots of land were to be taken from the monopolistic owners and
distributed evenly among the people. Compensation was to be
paid to the former owners. According to Phillip Bonsal, "
Nothing Castro said, nothing stated in the agrarian reform
statute Castro signed in 1958, and nothing in the law that was
promulgated in the Official Gazzette of June 3, 1959, warranted
the belief that in two years a wholesale conversion of Cuban
agricultural land to state ownership would take place".(5) Such
a notion then would have been inconsistent with many of the
Castro pronouncements, including the theory of a peasant
revolution and the pledges to the landless throughout the
nation. Today most of the people who expected to become
independent farmers or members of cooperatives in the operation
of which they would have had a voice are now laborers on the
state payroll. (6)
After secretly drawing up his Land Reform Law, Castro used
it to form the National Institute of Agrarian Reform (INRA)
with broad and ill defined powers. Through the INRA Castro
methodically seized all American holdings in Cuba. He promised
compensation but frequently never gave it. He conducted
investigations into company affairs, holding control over them
in the meantime, and then never divulging the results or giving
back the control. (7)
These seizures were protested. On January 11 Ambassador
Bonsal delivered a note to Havana protesting the Cuban
government seizure of U.S. citizens property. The note was
rejected the same night as a U.S. attempt to keep economic
control over Cuba. (8)
As this continued Castro was engineering a brilliant
propaganda campaign aimed at accusing the U.S. of "conspiring
with the counter revolutionaries against the Castro regime"(9).
Castro's ability to whip the masses into a frenzy with wispy
fallacies about American "imperialist" actions against Cuba was
his main asset. He constantly found events which he could work
the "ol Castro magic " on, as Nixon said , to turn it into
another of the long list of grievances, real or imagined, that
Cuba had suffered.
Throughout Castro's rule there had been numerous minor
attacks and disturbances in Cuba. Always without any
investigation whatsoever, Castro would blatantly and publicly
blame the U.S..
Castro continually called for hearings at the Organization
of American States and the United Nations to hear charges
against the U.S. of "overt aggression". These charges were
always denied by the councils. (10)
Two events that provided fuel for the Castro propaganda
furnace stand out. These are the "bombing" of Havana on
October 21 and the explosion of the French munitions ship La
Coubre on March 4, 1960.(11)
On the evening of October 21 the former captain of the
rebel air force, Captain Dian-Lanz, flew over Havana and
dropped a quantity of virulently anti-Castro leaflets. This was
an American failure to prevent international flights in
violation of American law. Untroubled by any considerations of
truth or good faith, the Cuban authorities distorted the
facts of the matter and accused the U.S. of a responsibility
going way beyond negligence. Castro, not two days later,
elaborated a bombing thesis, complete with "witnesses", and
launched a propaganda campaign against the U.S. Ambassador
Bonsal said, "This incident was so welcome to Castro for his
purposes that I was not surprised when, at a later date, a
somewhat similar flight was actually engineered by Cuban secret
agents in Florida."(12)
This outburst constituted "the beginning of the end " in
U.S.- Cuban relations. President Eisenhower stated ,"Castro's
performance on October 26 on the "bombing" of Havana spelled
the end of my hope for rational relations between Cuba and the
U.S."(13)
Up until 1960 the U.S. had followed a policy of non
intervention in Cuba. It had endured the slander and seizure
of lands, still hoping to maintain relations. This ended,
when, on March 4, the French munitions ship La Coubre arrived
at Havana laden with arms and munitions for the Cuban
government. It promptly blew up with serious loss of life. (14)
Castro and his authorities wasted no time venomously
denouncing the U.S. for an overt act of sabotage. Some
observers concluded that the disaster was due to the careless
way the Cubans unloaded the cargo. (15) Sabotage was possible
but it was preposterous to blame the U.S. without even a
pretense of an investigation.
Castro's reaction to the La Coubre explosion may have been
what tipped the scales in favor of Washington's abandonment of
the non intervention policy. This, the continued slander, and
the fact that the Embassy had had no reply from the Cuban
government to its representations regarding the cases of
Americans victimized by the continuing abuses of the INRA.
The American posture of moderation was beginning to become,
in the face of Castro's insulting and aggressive behavior, a
political liability. (16)
The new American policy, not announced as such, but
implicit in the the actions of the United States government was
one of overthrowing Castro by all means available to the U.S.
short of open employment of American armed forces in Cuba.
It was at this time that the controversial decision was
taken to allow the CIA to begin recruiting and training of
ex-Cuban exiles for anti-Castro military service. (17)
Shortly after this decision, following in quick steps,
aggressive policies both on the side of Cuba and the U.S. led
to the eventual finale in the actual invasion of Cuba by the
U.S!
In June 1960 the U.S. started a series of economic
aggressions toward Cuba aimed at accelerating their downfall.
The first of these measures was the advice of the U.S. to
the oil refineries in Cuba to refuse to handle the crude
petroleum that the Cubans were receiving from the Soviet Union.
The companies such as Shell and Standard Oil had been buying
crude from their own plants in Venezuela at a high cost. The
Cuban government demanded that the refineries process the crude
they were receiving from Russia at a much cheaper price. These
refineries refused at the U.S. advice stating that there were
no provisions in the law saying that they must accept the
Soviet product and that the low grade Russian crude would
damage the machinery. The claim about the law may have been
true but the charge that the cheaper Soviet
crude damaging the
machines seems to be an excuse to cover up the attempted
economic strangulation of Cuba. (The crude worked just fine as
is soon to be shown)
Upon receiving the refusal Che Gueverra, the newly
appointed head of the National Bank,and known anti-American,
seized all three major oil company refineries and began
producing all the Soviet crude,not just the 50% they had
earlier bargained for. This was a big victory and a stepping
stone towards increasing the soon to be controversial alliance
with Russia.
On July 6, a week after the intervention of the refineries,
President Eisenhower announced that the balance of Cuba's 1960
sugar quota for the supply of sugar to the U.S. was to be
suspended. (18). This action was regarded as a reprisal to
the intervention of the refineries. It seems obvious that it
was a major element in the calculated overthrow of Castro.
In addition to being an act of destroying the U.S. record
for statesmanship in Latin America, this forced Cuba into
Russia's arms and vice-versa.
The immediate loss to Cuba was 900,000 tons of sugar
unsold. This was valued at about $100,000,000.(19) Had the
Russians not come to the rescue it would have been a serious
blow to Cuba. But come to the rescue they did, cementing the
Soviet-Cuban bond and granting Castro a present he could have
never given himself. As Ernest Hemingway put it,"I just hope to
Christ that the United States doesn't cut the sugar quota. That
will really tear it. It will make Cuba a gift to the
Russians." (20) And now the gift had been made.
Castro had announced earlier in a speech that action
against the sugar quota would cost Americans in Cuba "down to
the nails in their shoes" (21) Castro did his best to carry
that out. In a decree made as the Law of Nationalization, he
authorized expropriation of American property at Che Gueverra's
discretion. The compensation scheme was such that under
current U.S. - Cuban trade relations it was worthless and
therefore confiscation without compensation.
The Soviet Unions assumption of responsibility of Cuba's
economic welfare gave the Russians a politico-military stake in
Cuba. Increased arms shipments from the U.S.S.R and
Czechoslovakia enabled Castro to rapidly strengthen and expand
his forces. On top of this Cuba now had Russian military
support. On July 9, three days after President Eisenhowers
sugar proclamation, Soviet Premier Nikita Kruschev announced,
"The U.S.S.R is raising its voice and extending a helpful hand
to the people of Cuba.....Speaking figuratively in case of
necessity Soviet artillerymen can support the Cuban people with
rocket fire. (22) Castro took this to mean direct commitment
made by Russia to protect the Cuban revolution in case of U.S.
attack. The final act of the U.S. in the field of economic
aggression against Cuba came on October 19, 1960, in the form
of a trade embargo on all goods except medicine and medical
supplies. Even these were to be banned within a few months.
Other than causing the revolutionaries some inconvenience, all
the embargo accomplished was to give Castro a godsend. For the
past 25 years Castro has blamed the shortages, rationings,
breakdowns and even some of the unfavorable weather conditions
on the U.S. blockade.
On January 6, 1961, Castro formally broke relations with
the United States and ordered the staff of the U.S. embassy to
leave. Immediately after the break in relations he ordered
full scale mobilization of his armed forces to repel an
invasion from the United States, which he correctly asserted
was imminent. For at this time the Washington administration,
under new President-elect Kennedy was gearing up for the Cuban
exile invasion of Cuba. The fact that this secret was ill kept
led to increased arms being shipped to Cuba by Russia in late
1960.
President Kennedy inherited from the Eisenhower-Nixon
administration the operation that became the Bay of Pigs
expedition. The plan was ill conceived and a fiasco.
Both Theodore Sorensen and Arthur Schlesinger describe the
President as the victim of a process set in motion before his
inauguration and which he, in the first few weeks of his
administration, was unable to arrest in spite of his
misgivings. Mr. Schlesinger writes -"Kennedy saw the project
in the patios of the bureaucracy as a contingency plan. He did
not yet realize how contingency planning could generate its own
reality." (23)
The fact is that Kennedy had promised to pursue a more
successful policy towards Cuba. I fail to see how the proposed
invasion could be looked upon as successful. The plan he
inherited called for 1500 patriots to seize control over their
seven million fellow citizens from over 100,000 well trained,
well armed Castroite militia!
As if the plan wasn't doomed from the start, the
information the CIA had gathered about the strength of the
uprising in Cuba was outrageously misleading. If we had won,
it still would have taken prolonged U.S. intervention to make
it work. This along with Kennedys decision to rule out
American forces or even American officers or experts, whose
participation was planned, doomed the whole affair.
Additionally these impromptu ground rules were not relayed
to the exiles by the CIA, who were expecting massive U.S.
military backing!
The exiles had their own problems; guns didn't work, ships
sank, codes for communication were wrong, the ammunition was
the wrong kind - everything that could go wrong, did. As could
be imagined the anti-Castro opposition achieved not one of its
permanent goals. Upon landing at the Bay of Pigs on April 17,
1961, the mission marked a landmark failure in U.S. foreign
politics. By April 20, only three days later, Castro's forces
had completely destroyed any semblance of the mission: they
killed 300 and captured the remaining 1,200!
Many people since then have chastised Kennedy for his
decision to pull U.S. military forces. I feel that his only
mistake was in going ahead in the first place, although, as
stated earlier, it seems as if he may not have had much choice.
I feel Kennedy showed surer instincts in this matter than
his advisors who pleaded with him not to pull U.S. forces. For
if the expedition had succeeded due to American armed forces
rather than the strength of the exile forces and the anti-
Castro movement within Cuba, the post Castro government would
have been totally unviable: it would have taken constant
American help to shore it up. In this matter I share the
opinion of `ambassador Ellis O. Briggs, who has written "The
Bay of Pigs operation was a tragic experience for the Cubans
who took part, but its failure was a fortunate (if mortifying)
experience for the U.S., which otherwise might have been
saddled with indefinite occupation of the island.
Beyond its immediately damaging effects, the Bay of Pigs
fiasco has shown itself to have far reaching consequences.
Washington's failure to achieve its goal in Cuba provided
the catalyst for Russia to seek an advantage and install
nuclear missiles in Cuba. The resulting "missile crisis" in
1962 was the closest we have been to thermonuclear war.
America's gain may have been America's loss. A successful
Bay of Pigs may have brought the United States one advantage.
The strain on American political and military assets resulting
from the need to keep the lid on in Cuba might have lid on Cuba
might have led the President of the United States to resist,
rather than to enthusiastically embrace, the advice he received
in 1964 and 1965 to make a massive commitment of American air
power, ground forces, and prestige in Vietnam.
Cuban troops have been a major presence as Soviet
surrogates all over the world, notably in Angola.
The threat of exportation of Castro's revolution permeates
U.S.-Central and South American policy. (Witness the invasion
of Grenada.)
This fear still dominates todays headlines. For years the
U.S. has urged support for government of El Salvador and the
right wing Contras in Nicaragua. The major concern underlying
American policy in the area is Castro's influence. The fear of
a Castro influenced regime in South and Central America had
such control of American foreign policy as to almost topple the
Presidency in the recent Iran - Contra affair. As a result the
U.S. government has once again faced a crisis which threatens
to destroy its credibility in foreign affairs. All because of
one man with a cigar.
In concluding I would like to state my own feelings on the
whole affair as they formed in researching the topic. To
start, all the information I could gather was one-sided. All
the sources were American written, and encompassed an American
point of view. In light of this knowledge, and with the
advantage of hindsight, I have formulated my own opinion of
this affair and how it might have been more productively
handled. American intervention should have been held to a
minimum. In an atmosphere of concentration on purely Cuban
issues, opposition to Castro's personal dictatorship could be
expected to grow. Admittedly, even justified American
retaliation would have led to Cuban counterretaliation and so
on with the prospect that step by step the same end result
would have been attained as was in fact achieved. But the
process would have lasted far longer; measured American
responses might have appeared well deserved to an increasing
number of Cubans, thus strengthening Cuban opposition to the
regime instead of, as was the case, greatly stimulating
revolutionary fervor, leaving the Russians no choice but to
give massive support to the Revolution and fortifying the
belief among anti-Castro Cubans that the United States was
rapidly moving to liberate them. The economic pressures
available to the United States were not apt to bring Castro to
his knees, since the Soviets were capable of meeting Cuban
requirements in such matters as oil and sugar. I believe the
Cuban government would have been doomed by its own
disorganization and incompetence and by the growing
disaffection of an increasing number of the Cuban people. Left
to its own devices, the Castro regime would have withered on
the vine.
ammunition was
the wrong kind - everything that could go wrong, di
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