Center for International Policy

As printed in
The South Florida Sun-Sentinel
February 2, 2006

U.S. policy's effect the opposite of goal

By Wayne S. Smith

This past Dec. 19, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice reconvened the Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba, originally called into being by President Bush in 2003 to explore ways "to hasten and ease a democratic transition in Cuba." The commission had last met in May 2004 to present its first report and its recommendations to "bring down the Castro government."

Reconvening the commission, Rice declared triumphantly, sent a message to the Cuban people that "now is the time for change in Cuba." By implementing the recommendations in the commission's first report, she said, the Bush administration had "empowered Cuban civil society to better organize and advocate for democratic change …, " had denied revenue to the dictatorship, and had begun to break the regime's "information blockade."

Really? What were those recommendations now supposedly successfully implemented?

First, to deny revenues, the commission had recommended dramatic restrictions on travel to Cuba. These were implemented, but did not place significant new strains on the Cuban economy, as Rice would have us believe. The new measures did indeed dramatically reduce the number of Americans and Cuban-Americans traveling to the island, but this was more than made up for by increased numbers of Canadian, European and Latin American (especially Venezuelan) tourists. Tourist income for the 2004-2005 period was higher than it had been the previous year and it will be even higher in the 2005-2006 season.

Cuban-American families are suffering. Castro is not.

Apparently the administration hopes to break though the regime's "information blockade" by, among other things, expanding Radio and TV Martí broadcasting. But Radio Martí has been broadcasting to Cuba for some 20 years now without the slightest impact on public opinion. Even if technical problems could be solved (by transmitting from aircraft, for example), TV Martí is not likely to have any more impact than Radio Martí has had. Cubans recognize propaganda, whether from Havana or Miami, and mostly tune it out.

And we can only wonder if the electric sign on the fifth floor of the U.S. Interests Section that stirred such turmoil recently is also part of the administration's plan to break through the regime's "information blockade." If so, it is but another sign of intellectual bankruptcy.

When Rice suggests we have "empowered Cuban civil society to better organize and advocate for democratic change," she doubtless means through increased support to the dissidents. But it is difficult indeed to see how the U.S. has "empowered" them to do anything.

There are, to be sure, a handful of dissidents who seem to hang around the U.S. Interests Section saying we are doing the right thing. But I was just in Cuba, talked to a number of the leading dissidents and found them all strongly opposed to U.S. policy, which they describe as counterproductive.

All noted that the human rights situation has worsened over the past year, and they saw a direct relationship between this and the harsher, more hostile U.S. approach. The more the Bush administration threatens measures to bring down the Cuban government, said Manuel Cuesta Morua of the Arco Progresista group, the more forcefully will that government demand internal discipline. Increased repression is the inevitable result. In other words, he said, "U.S. policy makes our work more difficult."

Elizardo Sánchez of the Commission for Human Rights and National Reconciliation agreed. His group, he said, had just published a report noting that the number of political prisoners has increased from 306 to 333 and that pressures against dissidents have increased notably over the past year.

At the time of President Carter's visit to Cuba in May 2002, he noted, there had been a greater atmosphere of tolerance. Things seemed to be moving in the right direction. But then came the harsher U.S. approach calling for regime change. Since then, he said, "U.S. policy toward Cuba has had an effect exactly the opposite of the one you should want."

All were especially critical of the new travel controls, noting that elsewhere the United States has always held that the free flow of peoples across borders is the best means of encouraging greater openness and the productive exchange of ideas. That should be true in the Cuban case as well, and they urged that travel controls be lifted. "No purpose is served," said Manuel Cuesta Morua, "by further isolating our people."

Oswaldo Payá of the Varela Project commented morosely that "all this is just more of the same. It hasn't worked before and won't work now."

He is right. It is a road that leads nowhere. In her remarks on Dec. 19, Rice made it sound as if the Castro regime is on its last legs and needs but one little push. But that is a pipe dream. With the new relationship with oil-rich Venezuela, with China now moving in as Cuba's second largest trading partner (just behind Venezuela), and a promising new oil find off the north coast, neither the Cuban economy nor the Castro regime are in any danger of collapse. Quite the contrary.

Castro will, of course, pass from the scene at some point, but a successor regime is already being formed.

Wayne S. Smith, now a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy in Washington, D.C., is the former chief of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana (1979-82).