Castro or the terrorists’coherence  

Carlos Alberto Montaner*

Francisco Flores, President of El Salvador,  looked into Castro’s eyes, and with enormous firmness  accused him of being responsible for the countless deaths  occurred in his country.  The Iberian-American Summit  shook.  The commander, who had just refused to sign a  sanction condemning the Basque ETA- a terrorist  organization with 800 crimes on its history-, did not  deny the accusation.  The revolutionary tradition, he  assured, is such.  Flores had experienced it in his own  flesh: the Castroist Salvadorans had assassinated his  father-in-law, an excellent man.

 Frankly, I had been waiting for something like this to  happen for a long time.  Several years ago, also during  a summit, Castro had a strong encounter with the then  Uruguayan president Luis Alberto Lacalle- who was not  intimidated either- but it was a private encounter. What  happened now took place in front of millions of  televiewers the world over and Castro had the worst  of it: he stammered, adopted gestures proper of a  barrio  killer and tried to place himself as a victim.  Finally,  Hugo Chávez, abandoning for a moment Bolívar’s sword,  acted like a clown- that other disguise he uses in coming  to  the scene- and gracelessly repeated an old joke geared  to lessen the tension of the situation. Castro gave him a  despiteful look. He was not looking for peace.  He wanted  to openly defend his right to “revolutionary internationalism”.

 It is interesting: Fidel, with the least of intentions to  respect agreements, had signed his adherence to  democracy in Guadalajara, Mexico, his acceptance of  political pluralism in Viña del Mar, Chile, or his respect  to human rights in Cartagena, Colombia, but in Panama,  he was not ready to lie concerning his commitment with  errorists.  This has been the central point of his political  activities – the forging of a communist world obtained  through violence- and around that vision and to that  ission he has structured his values and priorities.  Lying  to Lagos, Aznar or to Cardoso lacks importance.  They  are, after all, his ideological adversaries.  To trick  good-natured Andrés Pastrana, with his archangelical  innocence, could be a justified mischief.   On the other  hand, to execrate ETA contributing to its discredit  constitutes a betrayal to his most cherished principles.  During more than thirty years, since 1966, ETA has  been his allied, his friend.  The Cuban intelligence  has trained and helped ETA.  How could, Fidel Castro,  look at himself in the mirror the following day after  incurring in that abominable weakness?

 The truth is that Castro is a coherent leader. Those not  usually coherent are the leaders of the Latin American  democracies.  How many deaths, how much suffering  has cost them the Cuban intervention in the  Iberian-American societies? And they could not say that  were “struggles of national liberation” or “revolutions  against dictatorships”, because it is not true: Rómulo  Betancourt and Leoni’s Venezuela was a country just  coming out of Pérez Jiménez’ tyranny.  When Belaúnde  was trying to consolidate democracy in Perú, Castro  was trying to unstabilize it.  The Cuban cooperation  FARC, the M-19 and ELN of Colombia has always  worked against freely elected governments.  The support  to the Uruguayan Tupamaros was done with the  objective of destroying freedom in that country.  In  Argentina, after a decade of shameful good relations  between the military and the Cuban dictatorship, how  did Castro dismiss Raul Alfonsín’s trembling and  fragile government?  Training and arming those  ttacking La Tablada in 1989.  But, what did Raul  Alfonsín do ten years later when his coreligionist  Fernando de la Rúa adds the Argentinean vote to the  democratic vote in Geneva sanctioning Fidel Castro  for violation of human rights?  Alfonsín did something  terrible and contradictory: he attacked De la Rúa  and provoked a crisis within radicalism. Instead of  supporting the president, his partner in the party, in  defense of democratic values, he supported the tyrant  who had dug a knife on the back to his country and to  his government in the most critical moment.

 It is not an exceptional case.  Why is it that Andrés  Pastrana, who at the time he was in the opposition  told me that he felt a deep disregard for Fidel Castro,  and as he comes into power he makes Fidel Castro his  friend, taking him by the elbows, looking at him in  ecstasy and incurs in the silliness of trying to use  him to put an end to violence?  No one has told Pastrana  where politics end and when the Stockholm syndrome  begins?  How could he be a friend to one that has done  so much damage to the people that has elected him to  find protection and to enforce the laws? How far can  inconsequence reach?  We are not dealing with a tyrant  that has repented and has apologized.  We are dealing  with a dictator who has not yielded a millimeter, who  as not abandoned any of his attitudes and who would  not even lend himself to play with the rhetoric of  condemning his Basque terrorist allies because he  is too careful not incurring in those cunning tricks of  the “repulsive politicians of the multi-trash”, as Castro  always refers to democrats.

Perhaps Francisco Flores has lifted the ban.  It is  difficult to know it.  There is, nevertheless, an  encouraging fact.  Spain has reacted within the  European Union and Minister Piqué has begun to  treat Castro for what he is: a tenacious enemy of  Spain’s democracy.  May the example spread.  ---------------------------------------------------------

* Carlos Alberto Montaner is an author, journalist,  university professor and lecturer in many institutions  both of Latin America and of the United States.  His books have been translated into English, Italian,  Portuguese and Russian. He is the most read columnist  in the Spanish language.  He lives in Madrid since 1970. Octavio Noda, editor

Noviembre 26, 2000