{"id":198384,"date":"2021-11-01T12:00:47","date_gmt":"2021-11-01T12:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=198384"},"modified":"2021-10-27T05:20:34","modified_gmt":"2021-10-27T04:20:34","slug":"how-u-s-interference-in-cuba-creates-a-false-picture-of-its-society","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2021\/11\/how-u-s-interference-in-cuba-creates-a-false-picture-of-its-society\/","title":{"rendered":"How U.S. Interference in Cuba Creates a False Picture of Its Society"},"content":{"rendered":"

26 Oct 2021 – <\/em>U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) appears to be obsessed with Cuba. Every few days he takes to social media<\/a> or makes remarks<\/a> to the press about his desire to overthrow the Cuban Revolution. In recent months, Rubio has played a key role in drumming up support for anti-government protests in Cuba. On September 23, 2021, for instance, Rubio tweeted<\/a>, \u201cThe brave people of Cuba lost their fear of protesting against the dictatorship that represses them. Holgu\u00edn raises its voice against tyranny.\u201d Rubio included an article<\/a> about the Cuban town of Holgu\u00edn in his tweet, where \u201ca group of Cuban citizens\u201d are planning to hold a \u201cmarch against violence\u201d on November 20. This article appeared in Diario de Cuba, a news site based in Miami, Florida, which received<\/a> substantial funding from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) from 2016 to 2019, an independent nonprofit that is largely funded<\/a> by \u201cthe U.S. Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n

A quick study of the Diario de Cuba website reveals that it regularly publishes<\/a> news relating to Marco Rubio\u2019s views against the Cuban government. According to the Diario de Cuba article shared by Rubio on the November 20 march, the initiative has been promoted by a group called Archipi\u00e9lago<\/a> that proposes to carry out such peaceful demonstrations<\/a> throughout Cuba. Rubio has extended his support for the march and on September 29 tweeted<\/a> about a request by the citizens of Guant\u00e1namo seeking similar permission to hold a march on November 20. In his tweet, he shared an article from the news site CiberCuba, which is operated from Florida and Spain. There are several<\/a> other news sites reporting on Cuba that are funded by the United States government and by foundations like the Open Society and NED, including ADN Cuba, Cubanos por el Mundo, Cubita NOW, CubaNet, El Estornudo, Periodismo de Barrio, Tremenda Nota, El Toque, and YucaByte.<\/p>\n

A wide range of these U.S. government-funded websites and politicians such as Rubio have been leading the propaganda to support more protests in Cuba. On October 5, the U.S. administration of President Joe Biden also provided support to this agenda. The U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Brian Nichols tweeted<\/a>, \u201cThe fight for a free press and free expression continues in Cuba.\u201d Meanwhile, during an event hosted<\/a> by Georgetown Americas Institute, Juan Gonzalez, the senior director for the Western Hemisphere at the National Security Council, criticized the Cuban government for arresting<\/a> artists and protesters. \u201c[W]hen you put artists in jail for singing and for demanding freedom, there\u2019s something wrong with you,\u201d he said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

November 15<\/strong><\/p>\n

On October 9, the U.S. Embassy in Havana issued a statement<\/a> that criticized the Cuban government\u2019s decision \u201cto hold military exercises throughout the country on November 18 and 19, ending on November 20 with National Defense Day,\u201d calling it \u201ca blatant attempt to intimidate Cubans.\u201d The Cuban government holds this regular exercise to prepare its 11 million citizens for multiple scenarios that range from a possible U.S. invasion to natural disasters. Normally military personnel, the civil defense forces, and members of the general population participate.<\/p>\n

To counter this announcement, Archipi\u00e9lago announced on its Facebook page that the march would now be moved<\/a> to November 15 (from November 20), the day Cuban authorities are expected to open<\/a> its border to tourism. Meanwhile, several U.S. government officials and U.S. elected officials gave their support to what is now being called the 15N March.<\/p>\n

The first wave of support came from the U.S. elected officials\u2014most of them children of Cuban exiles\u2014who have publicly committed themselves to overthrowing the Cuban Revolution. On October 10, Florida Congresswoman Mar\u00eda Elvira Salazar gave her support for the 15N March. The Biden administration, she told<\/a> the host of a news program on a Miami television channel, must provide Cuban protesters with clandestine internet access. Two days later, on October 12, Senator Rubio criticized<\/a> the Cuban government for censoring news about the march, while on October 15 Florida Congressman Carlos Gim\u00e9nez, the child of Cuban parents who were landowners before 1959, also tweeted<\/a> in support of the march. Gim\u00e9nez included an article<\/a> from the Hill in his tweet that referred to 15N as a \u201ccivil liberties protest.\u201d Florida\u2019s other senator, Rick Scott, joined Rubio in tweeting<\/a> that the U.S. government \u201ccan\u2019t sit on the sidelines during this fight for freedom in Cuba.\u201d Scott has introduced<\/a> a bill in the Senate to increase economic sanctions on Cuba. Meanwhile, the Cuban government denied<\/a> permission to Archipi\u00e9lago to hold the march on November 15.<\/p>\n

Soon after, on October 16, the U.S. State Department published a statement<\/a> that condemned the Cuban government\u2019s decision to \u201cdeny permission for peaceful protests.\u201d U.S. State Department spokesperson Ned Price tweeted<\/a> on October 16 about the U.S. support for \u201cpeaceful assembly\u201d by the Cuban people, which was retweeted<\/a> by the U.S. Embassy in Havana on the same day. On October 17, Nichols also tweeted<\/a> about the Cuban denial for the 15N protest. This was retweeted by the U.S. Embassy in Havana and by Bradley Freden, interim U.S. permanent representative to the Organization of American States.<\/p>\n

On October 20, Nichols shared<\/a> a Human Rights Watch report<\/a> on the July protests in Cuba to once more criticize the government for preventing peaceful marches. Two days later, on October 22, Gonzalez warned<\/a> that the U.S. would have to take action if Cuba does not allow the 15N protest to take place.<\/p>\n

The atmosphere is charged. The U.S. government and right-wing Cubans who are in the U.S. Congress have tried to define the terrain for events in mid-November in Cuba. They will ramp up pressure to overthrow the government.<\/p>\n

Arrange an Accident<\/strong><\/p>\n

In April 2021, the National Security Archive declassified<\/a> the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency top-secret documents about Cuba. These documents showed that in July 1960, the U.S. government planned to assassinate Ra\u00fal Castro by paying a Cubana Airlines pilot to crash his plane. High-level CIA officials who were part of the agency at the time (former CIA Deputy Director of Plans Tracy Barnes, former CIA head of the Western Hemisphere Division J.C. King and a former CIA officer in Cuba William J. Murray) worked with the Cuban pilot (Jos\u00e9 Raul Mart\u00ednez) to ensure a \u201cfatal accident\u201d that would lead to the death of Ra\u00fal Castro. The pilot, however, never found the \u201copportunity\u201d to carry out such an accident.<\/p>\n

The attempt on Ra\u00fal Castro\u2019s life is one of many projects by the U.S. government to overthrow the Cuban Revolution, including 638<\/a> attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro and the invasion<\/a> at the Bay of Pigs in 1961.<\/p>\n

Reading the CIA documents from 1960 onward, most of which are available in the CIA reading room<\/a>, shows how cliched\u2014and yet dangerous\u2014the attempts to overthrow the Cuban Revolution by the U.S. government have been. The buildup to 15N bears all the marks of this history, one ghoulish plot both cooked up in and executed by Washington and Miami.<\/p>\n

_____________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> Manolo De Los Santos<\/strong> is a researcher and a political activist. For 10 years, he worked in the organization of solidarity and education programs to challenge the United States\u2019 regime of illegal sanctions and blockades. Based out of Cuba for many years, Manolo has worked toward building international networks of people\u2019s movements and organizations. In 2018, he became the founding director of the <\/em>People\u2019s Forum<\/a> in New York City, a movement incubator for working-class communities to build unity across historic lines of division at home and abroad. He also collaborates as a researcher with <\/em>Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research<\/a> and is a <\/em>Globetrotter\/Peoples Dispatch fellow. He is a co-editor of <\/em>Comrade of the Revolution, available from <\/em>1804 Books<\/a> and LeftWord Books<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Vijay Prashad<\/strong> is an Indian historian, editor and journalist. He is a writing fellow and chief correspondent at<\/em> Globetrotter. He is the director of <\/em>Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research<\/a> and a senior non-resident fellow at Chongyang Institute for Financial Studies<\/a>, Renmin University of China. He has written more than 20 books, including <\/em>The Darker Nations<\/a> and <\/em>The Poorer Nations<\/a>. His latest book is <\/em>Washington Bullets<\/a>, with an introduction by Evo Morales Ayma.<\/em><\/p>\n

This article was produced by Globetrotter<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

26 Oct 2021 – The atmosphere is charged. The U.S. government and right-wing Cubans who are in the U.S. Congress have tried to define the terrain for events in mid-November in Cuba. They will ramp up pressure to overthrow the government.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":198386,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[867,2642,530,1126,1050,541,1190,70],"class_list":["post-198384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latin-america-and-the-caribbean","tag-anglo-america","tag-anti-imperialism","tag-cuba","tag-hegemony","tag-imperialism","tag-latin-america-caribbean","tag-regime-change","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=198384"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198384\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/198386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=198384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=198384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=198384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}