Cuba Libre: A 500-Year Quest for Independence

by Philip Brenner

But while Fidel remained in charge, the advice tended to fall on deaf ears. He generally viewed privatization and market mechanisms as fundamental threats to the Revolution’s values. In a November 2005 speech to students at the University of Havana, he sarcastically referred to the reforms in the 1990s as “the ‘progressive advances’ of the special period,” arguing that in fact they were “robbery” that engendered inequality and theft.

  Pointing to the collapse of the Soviet Union, he suggested that it was caused by reforms that produced inequality, and he feared the same was happening in Cuba. “Were you aware of all these inequalities that I have been talking about?” he asked.

  Did you know that there are people who earn forty or fifty times the amount one of those doctors over there in the mountains of Guatemala, part of the “Henry Reeve” Contingent [Cuban international medical brigade], earns in one month? . . . saving lives and earning five percent or ten percent of what one of those dirty little crooks earns, selling gasoline to the new rich, diverting resources from the ports . . . stealing in a five-star hotel by exchanging a bottle of rum for another of lesser quality and pocketing the dollars for which he sells the drinks.43

  Setting Cuba on a New Course

  On July 31, 2006, news spread quickly throughout Havana that President Castro had been rushed to the hospital. At 9:15 p.m. that evening, his chief aide, Carlos Valenciaga, reported that Fidel had undergone surgery for major intestinal bleeding and an intestinal blockage. (This would be the first in a series of emergency abdominal procedures, during which the Cuban leader reportedly almost died three times on the operating table.) As a consequence, he temporarily ceded his three positions—head of state, first secretary of Cuba’s Communist Party, and commander in chief of the Revolutionary Armed Forces—to Raúl Castro. Fidel was twenty-six days shy of his eightieth birthday. His younger brother was seventy-five.

  Some people cheered and danced in the streets of Miami’s Little Havana. It was the moment about which many US policymakers and Cuban exiles had been dreaming. But for President George W. Bush, it was a nightmare. Anticipating chaos and a massive exodus, he warned Cubans “against leaving the island.”44

  In fact, there was no turmoil, no rush for the exit. Reality confounded critics who believed the country was held together only by Fidel’s charisma or iron fist. On Havana’s streets, people expressed sadness and continued on their way. Daily life in Cuba was undisturbed. The transition occurred almost seamlessly. Historian Julia Sweig noted that “Fidel’s almost five decades in power came to a close last summer not with the expected bang, or even really a whimper, but in slow motion, with Fidel himself orchestrating the transition.” She aptly characterized the handover as the Cuban leader’s “final victory.”45 A new era had begun.

  For a government to remain legitimate after the passing of its charismatic leader, it needs to substitute another form of legitimacy, that is, another basis on which the leaders can justify their right to rule. Consider that the United States had the same problem in its early years. The five presidents who followed the charismatic George Washington gained their legitimacy by their connection to the American Revolution, though that legitimacy was thinning when the son of a revolutionary leader, John Quincy Adams, became president. Political struggles over the next thirty years, and ultimately a civil war, settled the legitimacy of the national government.

  In a similar way, establishing the government’s legitimacy without Fidel was a primary task that confronted Raúl Castro as he accepted the reins of power. Of course, as one of the Cuban Revolution’s leaders, he was able to rely on his personal bona fides as a revolutionary—as early US presidents did. In addition, he surrounded himself with officials who also participated in the Revolution. But the members of the “historical” generation that overthrew Fulgencio Batista in 1959 (los historicos) were roughly all the same age.

  High on Raúl’s agenda, then, was strengthening a more rational, legal, and institutional basis for authority that would be necessary to sustain the Cuban Revolution in the future.46 At the same time, he had to institute change, to develop a model appropriate for the twenty-first century that would enable Cuba to develop its economy, maintain its commitment to providing basic needs for all Cubans equitably, sustain Cuba’s high standing in Latin America and the third world, and remain independent and sovereign over its own affairs.

  Notes

  1. Lázaro J. González González, “Melaza (Molasses) That Tastes Like a Movie,” On Cuba, January 18, 2013, http://oncubamagazine.com/culture/melaza-molasses-tastes-movie.

  2. Jorge Mario Sánchez-Egozcue, “Challenges of Economic Restructuring in Cuba,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader: The Revolution under Raúl Castro, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014), 134.

  3. Archibald R. M. Ritter, “Cuba’s Economic Reorientation,” in Cuba: In Transition? Pathways to Renewal, Long-Term Development and Global Reintegration, ed. Mauricio Font (New York: Bildner Center, CUNY, 2006).

  4. Pedro Monreal, “Development as an Unfinished Affair: Cuba after the ‘Great Adjustment’ of the 1990s,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader: Reinventing the Revolution, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007).

  5. Peter H. Kuck, “Nickel,” in US Department of the Interior, US Geological Survey, Minerals Yearbook—2003, 52.21, http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/nickel/nickemyb03.pdf.

  6. Philip Peters, “Cutting Losses: Cuba Downsizes Its Sugar Industry,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader: Reinventing the Revolution, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 135–37.

  7. Philip Peters, “Cuba’s Small Entrepreneurs: Down but Not Out” (Arlington, VA: Lexington Institute, September 2006), 6, 7.

  8. Hope Bastion Martinez, “‘Adjusting to the Adjustment’: Difference, Stratification and Social Mobility in Contemporary Havana, Cuba,” PhD diss. (Washington, DC: American University, 2016), 134–40.

  9. Martinez, “‘Adjusting to the Adjustment,’” 131–32.

  10. Margot Olavarria, “Rap and Revolution: Hip-Hop Comes to Cuba,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader: Reinventing the Revolution, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 367.

  11. John Williamson, “What Should the World Bank Think about the Washington Consensus?” World Bank Research Observer 15, no. 2 (2000): 251–64.

  12. Dexter Filkins and Dana Canedy, “Counting the Vote: Miami-Dade County; Protest Influenced Miami-Dade’s Decision to Stop Recount,” New York Times, November 24, 2000, A41; Evan Thomas and Mark Hosenball, “Cubans at the Wheel,” Newsweek, December 11, 2000, 40.

  13. Schoultz, That Infernal Little Cuban Republic, 516–17; Morley and McGillion, Unfinished Business, 187.

  14. Soraya M. Castro Mariño, “Like Sisyphus’s Stone: US-Cuban Relations in the Aftermath of September 11, 2001,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader: Reinventing the Revolution, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 220–21.

  15. David Gonzalez, “Carter and Powell Cast Doubt on Bioarms in Cuba,” New York Times, May 14, 2002.

  16. Wayne S. Smith and Anya K. Landau, “Cuba and Bioweapons: Groundless Allegations Squander US Credibility on Terrorism,” CIP Special Report, July 12, 2002 (Washington, DC: Center for International Policy, 2002).

  17. Tim Padgett, “Cuba’s Catholic Dissident: The Saga of Oswaldo Payá,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader: Reinventing the Revolution, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007).

  18. Bill Sternberg, “US Works for Regime Change in Cuba, Too,” USA Today, October 23, 2002, 10A.

  19. American Library Association, “Report of Visit to ACURIL XXXI and Its Host Country, Cuba, May 23–May 30, 2001,” July 13, 2001, http://www.ala.org/offices/iro/iroactivities/alacubanlibrariesreport.

  20. Patrick J. Haney and Walt Vanderbush, The Cuban Embargo: The Domestic Politics of an American Foreig
n Policy (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2005), 132–34, 150.

  21. “President Bush Discusses Cuba Policy in Rose Garden Speech,” October 10, 2003 (Washington, DC: Office of the Press Secretary, the White House).

  22. Quoted in Silvia Wilhelm, “New Cuba Policy Is Cruel, Ineffective,” Progressive, June 23, 2004.

  23. US Government Accountability Office, “Foreign Assistance: US Democracy Assistance for Cuba Needs Better Management and Oversight,” GAO-07-147, November 2006, http://www.gao.gov/assets/260/253560.pdf.

  24. As quoted in Daniel P. Erikson, The Cuba Wars: Fidel Castro, the United States, and the Next Revolution (New York: Bloomsbury, 2010), 23.

  25. Peter Eisner and Knut Royce, The Italian Letter: The Forgery That Started the Iraq War (Amazon Digital Services: Kindle Edition, 2014).

  26. Wayne S. Smith, “Provocation, War Spawned Cuba Crackdown,” Baltimore Sun, April 15, 2003.

  27. Edward B. Atkeson, “Why Cuba Fired,” Washington Post, March 13, 1996.

  28. Patrick Michael Rucker, “European Nations May Downgrade Cuba Ties after Castro Crackdown,” Financial Times, April 22, 2003.

  29. Joaquín Roy, “The European Union’s Perception of Cuba: From Frustration to Irritation,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader: Reinventing the Revolution, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 254.

  30. “Huge March in Havana Protests European Criticism of Castro,” New York Times, June 13, 2003.

  31. Fidel Castro Ruz, “Speech at the Ceremony Commemorating the 50th Anniversary of the Attack on the Moncada,” Santiago de Cuba, July 26, 2003, http://www.cuba.cu/Gobierno/Discursos/2003/Ing/F260703i.html.

  32. US Department of Commerce, Census Bureau, “Foreign Trade: Trade in Goods with Cuba,” May 16, 2016, https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c2390.html.

  33. Ari Fleischer, “Press Briefing,” Office of the Press Secretary, the White House, April 29, 2003, https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2003/04/20030429-3.html#2.

  34. Max Azicri, “The Castro-Chávez Alliance,” Latin American Perspectives 36, no. 1 (January 2009): 108.

  35. Hugo Chávez, “Interview,” CNN Larry King Live, September 24, 2009, http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0909/24/lkl.01.html.

  36. Castro and Ramonet, Fidel Castro, 526–28.

  37. Carlos A. Romero, “South-South Cooperation between Venezuela and Cuba,” Special Report on South-South Cooperation: A Challenge to the Aid System? (Reality of Aid Network, 2010), 108, 110; http://www.realityofaid.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/ROA-SSDC-Special-ReportEnglish.pdf.

  38. John M. Kirk, “Cuban Medical Internationalism Under Raúl Castro,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader: Reinventing the Revolution, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014), 258.

  39. Fidel Castro Ruz, “Key Address to a Solemn Session of the National Assembly,” Caracas, Venezuela, October 27, 2000, http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/2000/ing/f271000i.html.

  40. “China’s Policy Paper on Latin America and the Caribbean,” Xinhua, November 5, 2008, http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-11/05/content_10308117.htm.

  41. Adrian H. Hearn, “China and the Future of Cuba,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014), 233.

  42. David Shambaugh, “China’s New Foray into Latin America,” YaleGlobal Online Magazine, November 17, 2008, 1, http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/china%E2%80%99s-new-foray-latin-america.

  43. Fidel Castro Ruz, “Speech Delivered at the Commemoration of the 60th Anniversary of His Admission to University of Havana,” November 17, 2005, http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/2005/ing/f171105i.html.

  44. Pablo Bachelet, “US Policy Gives the Bush Administration Few Options in Cuba, Critics Say,” McClatchy Newspapers, August 2, 2006.

  45. Julia E. Sweig, “Fidel’s Final Victory,” Foreign Affairs (January/February 2007).

  46. Carlos Alzugaray Treto, “Continuity and Change in Cuba at 50: The Revolution at a Crossroads,” in A Contemporary Cuba Reader, ed. Philip Brenner et al. (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014), 42–43.

  Chapter 23

  The Transition from Fidel to Raúl Castro, 2006–2009

  [S]ince March, an experiment has been underway in six municipalities . . . where twenty thousand liters of milk have been directly and consistently delivered by the producer to 230 rationed stores and for social consumption in these localities every day. In this fashion, we have eliminated absurd procedures through which this valuable food product traveled hundreds of miles before reaching a consumer who, quite often, lived a few hundred meters away from the livestock farm, and, with this, the product losses and fuel expenses involved. I will give you one example. . . . Currently, in Mantua, one of the western most municipalities in Pinar del Rio, 2,492 liters of milk, which meet established consumption needs, are being distributed directly to the municipality’s forty rationed stores and two thousand liters of fuel are being saved every month. What was the situation until four months ago? The closest pasteurizer is located in the Sandino municipality, forty kilometers away from Mantua, the most important town in the area. Thus, in order to deliver the milk to that plant, a truck had to travel a minimum of eighty kilometers. . . . The milk that children and other consumers in Mantua receive on a regulated basis, once pasteurized at the Sandino plant, returned, shortly afterwards, on a vehicle which, as it is logical to assume, had to return to its base of operations after delivering the product. In total, it traveled 160 kilometers, a journey which, as I explained, was in fact longer.

  —Raúl Castro, July 26, 20071

  Profound Debate

  As Raúl Castro took over the reins of leadership, Cuba was at a high point in its relations with countries in Latin America, Africa, and Asia, and at a nadir in its relations with the United States and Europe. The Cuban government had weathered a Special Period that might have destabilized most other countries, but it was clear that political and economic reforms were necessary if the Cuban Revolution was going to be sustainable. The Cuban people had demonstrated a remarkable resilience and ability to adapt, but in 2006, the new leader could not be certain how much longer they would be patient.

  No One Can Afford to Spend More Than What They Have

  More than 70 percent of Cuba’s population—all those born after the Revolution—had known no leader other than Fidel Castro when he passed the reins of power to his brother. This presented an enormous challenge to Raúl Castro, even though he was first vice president and minister of the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR), had been a revolutionary commander, and served at Fidel’s side for the previous forty-seven years. He was still merely the interim president, supposedly in the position only until the elder Castro recovered his health. Recognizing that his authority was tenuous, the new leader proceeded cautiously. He announced few changes and made no dramatic moves during his first eighteen months in office. Yet he began to prepare the country for what he hoped would be a reinvented Cuban revolution.

  A three-part investigative report on corruption in Juventud Rebelde, the official newspaper of the Communist Party’s youth wing, was an early signal of changes to come. Published in October 2006, the series could not have appeared without Raúl’s approval. It revealed what most people already suspected. State-owned stores routinely sold products that weighed less than the amount customers had paid for; food at state restaurants had less meat or cheese than regulations required. Headlined “The Big Old Swindle” (La vieja gran estafa), the two reporters found in their three-month investigation that 52 percent of the centers they visited had price violations or alterations in the standard quality of products.2 A subsequent story in February 2007 reported that the sale of counterfeit products was widespread, especially in the production of “alcoholic drinks, cigarettes and cigars, soap, perfume, deodorant, coffee, ice-cream, and bottled water
.” At one store in Havana, bags labeled as export-quality Cubita coffee—requiring buyers to pay with Cuban convertible currency, the CUC—were filled with old coffee and ground peas.3

  In December 2006, the acting president encouraged university students to engage in the kind of open debate about Cuba’s future that his older brother had eschewed. Drawing on his own experience, the younger Castro said, “The first principle in constructing any armed forces is the sole command. But that doesn’t mean that we cannot discuss . . . that way we reach decisions, and I’m talking about big decisions.”4 He followed this admonition in July 2007, offering a frank assessment of Cuba’s economic circumstances in the annual address commemorating the 1953 Moncada attack.5

  Significantly, Raúl did not pin all of Cuba’s problems on the United States. He did observe that the US embargo “has a direct influence both on the major economic decisions as well as on each Cuban’s most basic needs.” But he emphasized that it was one of several external factors Cuba had to take into account in “ensuring the socialist principle that each should contribute according to their capacity and receive according to their work.” The main issue, he declared, was that

  No one, no individual or country, can afford to spend more than what they have. It seems elementary, but we do not always think and act in accordance with this inescapable reality. To have more, we have to begin by producing more, with a sense of rationality and efficiency, so that we may reduce imports, especially of food products—that may be grown here—whose domestic production is still a long way away from meeting the needs of the population.

  Then he warned that to achieve this goal “structural and conceptual changes will have to be introduced.”

  Challenging the Bureaucracy

  It would have been difficult to find a Cuban who did not despise the labyrinthine system of bureaucratic rules and procedures that the interim president pinpointed as a source of inefficiency and economic stagnation. As we quoted him at the beginning of this chapter, he highlighted the problem on July 26, 2007, by describing the waste entailed in shipping fresh milk forty kilometers to be pasteurized. Pasteurization, he noted, “makes sense” in “large urban centers—even though it is customary in Cuba to boil all milk at home, whether the milk is pasteurized or not.” But, he added, pasteurization “does not prove viable” for a few liters in a rural area.