As in numerous other cases, it is not Castro's crimes that disturb the rulers of the hemisphere, who cheerfully support the Suhartos and Saddam Husseins and Gramajos, or look the other way, as long as they "fulfill their main function." Rather, it is the elements of success that arouse fear and anger and the call for vengeance, a fact that must be suppressed by ideologists -- not an easy task, given the overwhelming evidence confirming this elementary principle of the intellectual culture.

In the 1980s, the US extended its economic warfare, barring industrial products containing any Cuban nickel, a major Cuban export. Those not affected by political Alzheimer's might recall the US Treasury Department order of April 1988 barring import of Nicaraguan coffee processed in a third country if it is not "sufficiently transformed to lose its Nicaraguan identity" -- recalling the language of the Third Reich, a Boston Globe editor observed. The US prohibited a Swedish medical supply company from providing equipment to Cuba because one component is manufactured in the US. Aid to the former Soviet Union was conditioned on its suspension of aid to Cuba. Gorbachev's announcement that such aid would be canceled was greeted with banner headlines: "Baker Hails Move," "Soviets Remove Obstacle to U.S. Economic Aid," "The Cuban-Soviet Connection: 31-Year Irritant to the U.S." At last, the grievous injury to us may be relieved.

In early 1991, the US resumed Caribbean military maneuvers, including rehearsal of a Cuba invasion, a standard technique of intimidation. In mid-1991, the embargo was tightened further, cutting remittances from Cuban-Americans, among other measures. In April 1992, gearing up for the election, President Bush barred ships that go to Cuba from US ports. New laws proposed by congressional liberals, cynically entitled the Cuban Democracy Act, would extend the embargo to US subsidiaries abroad, allowing seizure of cargo of ships that had landed in Cuba if they enter US territorial waters. The ferocity of the hatred for Cuban independence is extreme, and scarcely wavers across the narrow mainstream spectrum.²⁰

There has never been any effort to conceal the fact that the disappearance of the Soviet deterrent (like the removal of the British deterrent a century earlier) and the decline of East bloc economic relations with Cuba merely facilitates Washington's efforts to achieve its longstanding aims through economic warfare or other means. Candor is entirely in order: only the most devilish anti-American, after all, could question our right to act as suits our fancy. If, say, we choose to invade some defenseless country to capture one of our agents who no longer follows orders, and then try him for crimes committed while on our payroll, who could question the majesty of our system of justice? True, the UN did, but our veto took care of that childish tantrum. Even the Supreme Court has since accorded the US the right to kidnap alleged criminals abroad to bring them to justice here. Not for us the qualms of Adolf Hitler, who returned a German emigré abducted by Himmler's gangsters from Switzerland in 1937 after the Swiss government protested, appealing to basic principles of international law.²¹

In a typical commentary on Cuba's happy plight, the editors of the Washington Post urged that the US seize the opportunity to crush Castro: "For his great antagonist, the United States, to give relief and legitimacy to this used-up relic at this late hour would be to break faith with the Cuban people -- and with all the other democrats in the hemisphere." Pursuing the same logic, the editors, through the 1980s, called upon the US to coerce Nicaragua until it was restored to the "Central American mode" of the Guatemalan and Salvadoran terror states, observing their admirable "regional standards"; and scoffed at Gorbachev's "New Thinking" because he had not yet offered the US a free hand to achieve its objectives by the means condemned by the World Court (in a judgment that discredited the Court, the press and liberal commentators concluded). The Post speaks for the people of Cuba just as the State Department did in the Eisenhower-Kennedy years; as William McKinley spoke for "the vast majority of the population" of the Philippines who "welcome our sovereignty" and whom he was "protecting...against the designing minority" while slaughtering them by the hundreds of thousands; and as his proconsul Leonard Wood spoke for the decent (i.e., wealthy European) people of Cuba who favored US domination or annexation and had to be protected from the "degenerates."²² The US has never been short of good will for the suffering people of the world who have to be protected from the machinations of evil-doers. As for the Post's love of democracy, charity dictates silence. Its peers scarcely differ.

The Cuban record demonstrates with great clarity that the Cold War framework has been scarcely more than a pretext to conceal the standard refusal to tolerate Third World independence, whatever its political coloration. Traditional policies remain beyond serious challenge within the mainstream. The most obvious questions are ruled illegitimate, if not unthinkable. We can anticipate, then, efforts of the usual kind to ensure that the "ripe fruit" drops into the hands of its rightful owners, or is plucked more vigorously from the tree.

A cautious policy would be to tighten the stranglehold, resorting to economic and ideological warfare to punish the population while intimidating others to refrain from interfering. As suffering increases, it can be assumed, so will protest, repression, more unrest, etc., in the predictable cycle. At some stage, internal collapse will reach the point where the Marines can be sent in cost-free to "liberate" the island once again, restoring the old order while the faithful chant odes to our grand leaders and their righteousness. Transitory tactical concerns might accelerate the process, if a need is felt to arouse jingoist passions. But it is unlikely that Washington will veer far from the policies outlined in the Bush Administration National Security Policy Review already cited (p. 94).

²⁰ Smith, Closest of Enemies; Gillian Gunn, Current History, Feb. 1992. Thomas Friedman, NYT, Sept. 12, 1991. Michael Kranish, BG, April 19; NYT, April 19, 1992. Nicaraguan coffee, NI, 98.

²¹ Detlev Vagts, "Reconsidering the Invasion of Panama," Reconstruction, vol. 1.2, 1990. See DD, ch. 5.

²² WP weekly, Jan. 20-26, 1992; Post, see DD, 103, 141; NI, for more extensive review of Times-Post dogmas. Benjamin, US and Origins, 59; PI, 72.