How Castro uses the U.S.

Carlos Alberto Montaner

Twenty-five years ago, in April 1980, a spectacular event took place: Tens of thousands of desperate Cubans sailed aboard anything at all, headed to the south of the United States. It began a poignant migratory adventure that came to be known by the name of the place that the Cuban government provided as a port of departure: Mariel. In a few short weeks, while Castro permitted the mass flight of its citizens, no less than 125,000 people succeeded in crossing the Florida Straits.

At that time, it was said that if the comandante had not halted the exodus, it was likely that several million more individuals would have escaped from the socialist paradise.

In general, this new wave of exiles constituted a cross-section of Cuban society, with a more or less reasonable representation of professionals, workers, peasants, students, whites, blacks and mulattoes. There were only two categories of persons that had a proportionately greater representation than what was statistically predictable: homosexuals and persons convicted of common crimes.

Why? In the former case, because the Cuban government banished thousands of homosexuals at bayonet point, ongoing victims of the macho-Leninist hatred led by Castro and his homophobic backers, who since the 1960s had cruelly gone targeted anyone who didn't fit the definition of the Cuban ``new man.''

In the case of the common criminals, the dictator did something that fell within the definition of a serious international act of aggression: He selected the worst psychopaths and criminals locked up in Cuba's jails and put them aboard the vessels along with others emigrating to the United States. With that vile deed, Castro sought three objectives: to tarnish the image of his domestic adversaries, whom the rabble called escoria (scum) and beat in the streets; to punish the United States; and to empty out his crammed prisons, ridding them of a few thousand undesirables.

During the early days of the arrival of that striking human wave, generously taken in by the Carter administration and the state of Florida, some analysts opined that those Cubans would have a difficult time adapting to the United States, whereas they had undergone 20 years of Communist indoctrination.

Source of stability

The prediction, however, proved to be erroneous. The bulk of this group of immigrants managed admirably to become well-integrated into American society and, within a few years, made up part of the success story of Cuban exiles in the United States.

Castro is wont to portray himself to the world as a poor victim of the United States. But objective facts show that exactly the opposite is true. Washington has been a source of stability for his dictatorship.

Consider:

• During nearly half a century in power, Castro has succeeded in transporting 15 percent of the Cuban population to supposedly enemy territory.

• American farmers are his main providers of food supplies.

• The remittances from Cuban-American émigrés constitute the prime source of foreign currency that comes into Cuba.

• Powerful U.S. religious organizations are the most generous donors of humanitarian aid to Cuba.

• Ever since the rafter crisis of 1994, a U.S. promise to grant 20,000 visas a year to Cubans acts as a ''political Prozac.'' It keeps hundreds of thousands of people who are opposed to the government sweetly sedated, while they impatiently await the results of the (visa) lottery that will perhaps allow them to liberate themselves from the communist nightmare.

`Migratory bomb'

The only question for which there is no easy answer is why the United States, despite its immense power, has always been so timid in its confrontations with Castro throughout several decades. If some North African country were to launch a ''migratory bomb'' against Europe -- poisoned, moreover, with criminals released from its prisons -- the EU's reaction would be immediate, categorical and would have the backing of almost every sector of society.

Evidently, the lion is not as fierce as his enemies depict him. And Castro knows it.

Abril 5, 2005

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