PART IV – THE NEW PRESIDENT’S CARIBBEAN
When the Chinese President, Hu Jintao, visited Cuba last Tuesday on his way to the Apec Summit meeting in Lima, Peru, the Cuban Communist Party news agency pointed out that while China has now joined the rest of the world by embracing free market reforms, it criticized (and I quote the Associated Press) “the evils of such an accelerated spiral: unequal distribution of the country’s income, a marked difference between city and country, and the erosion of the environment.” The Castro regime doesn’t want China’s success to breed discontent in Havana. Accelerated market reform would bring them down, pretty quick I imagine. Up to now they haven’t needed to worry about this happening . . . our embargo against Americans doing business in Cuba has removed this threat for them.
It’s late, but not too late, for Congress and the White House to turn their attention to what’s going on, but it will becomes less of an opportunity for Washington to make an effective, strategic, move with relevant impact as Russia and China continue to deepen their commitment to Cuba and Venezuela. Action by Congress and the President within the next few months, freeing us to go to Cuba and conduct business, would send the very positive message to the rest of the world that the game is on and the USA is back as a player.
This will wake us all up, and pave the way for the U.S. to make the competition for the hearts and minds of the Cuban people a four-way battle. Until recently, the contest would have been between the Castro regime and us. Now Venezuela, China and Russia are in the mix. We still have the advantage, because the people of Cuba know they’d be much better off with U.S. business as their partner. If you don’t believe that, lets’ sneak into Cuba and ask them.
The Cuban embargo has helped keep the Castro’s in power by depriving the people of Cuba of an alternative to communism. Ceding Cuba to our communist protagonists, as we’ve done for the past 25 years, makes us the world’s laughing stock, with adverse consequences far beyond Cuba and the Caribbean.
There’s something more going on here, which is longer range but every bit as significant. As we allow China and Russia to become more closely aligned and entwined with the Castro and Hugo Chavez regimes, the strategic military prize in the game becomes the naval base at Guantanamo Bay, which from it’s perch on the southeast coast of Cuba commands a view over the entire Caribbean. They’d like to see Guantanamo Bay back in friendly Cuban hands so they can use it, and they might have the means to accomplish that without our firing a shot. I can show you how that might work, but doing so would give away the storyline of my fourth novel, which at this point is a work-in-progress. I’m waiting to see how our new Congress will play into the plot.
Sounds farfetched doesn’t it, but 30 years ago who would have thought the Chinese would be present today in Panama, operating and maintaining the Panama Canal. We gave the Canal back to Panama to save our good guy image to the world; what makes us think we won’t do the same with our Guantanamo Bay naval base?
The story of Havana Passage, published in 2005, takes place in 2009 with a new American President in office. The plot is based upon the real facts of the embargo and our misguided foreign policy, along with the intrigue it has spawned in Havana, Caracas, Moscow, and Beijing. If we don’t change our ways soon, my fourth novel, covering the coming conflict with China, Russia, Cuba and Venezuela over our lease for the naval base at Guantanamo Bay, will become as timely four or five years from now as Havana Passage is today.
Mark Twain had it right: The difference between truth and fiction is that fiction needs to be credible.