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Introduction: Cuba after Castro
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12142 |
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CURRENT ISSUES
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3 / 1994 |
446 Words |
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Cuba's communist regime is in crisis. The country's annual exports have dropped from $8 billion to less than $2 billion. The economy has suffered a 50 percent decline in the last four years. Desperate for hard currency, Havana announced that Cubans could now hold dollars--an astonishing move by a government that insisted socialism would determine Cuba's future.
There is growing political opposition from a network of human rights groups and a burgeoning trade union movement. The Roman Catholic Church has become a major player in politics. More and more prominent Cubans are defecting.
After 35 years, the fall of communism in Cuba is near, but a determined Fidel Castro clings to power. What should the United States do, or not do, to hasten Castro's end? How should the Cuban people, inside and outside the country go about making the difficult transition to political and economic freedom?
According to Roger Fontaine, a former Latin American expert with the National Security Council, Castro remains in power because of his personal charisma and strong will, a divided opposition, and an enormous security force personally loyal to him. With continued good health, Castro could lead Cuba for several more years, but Cuban communism will not survive Castro's demise.
While diplomatic and economic pressures on Cuba made sense during the Cold War, the United States should now lift its economic embargo and demonstrate it will not try to dictate Cuba's future. In so doing, argues William Ratliff of the Hoover Institution, Washington will avoid creating an economic-political crisis in Cuba, remove Castro's scapegoat--the United States--and reduce rather than increase tensions among Cubans.
Michael Wilson of the Heritage Foundation agrees that the primary responsibility for bringing democracy and a free-market system to Cuba rests with the Cuban people. But he insists that now is not the time for the United States to abandon a policy that has brought Castro and his communist government close to their end.
For nearly a century points out Mark Falcoff of the American Enterprise Institute, the United States and Cuba have frequently been in conflict--"the closest of enemies." However, the large Cuban exile community can be the human bridge that will close the gap of geopolitics and cultural misunderstanding between the two countries and peoples.
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