{"id":238203,"date":"2023-07-03T12:00:45","date_gmt":"2023-07-03T11:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=238203"},"modified":"2023-06-28T05:43:05","modified_gmt":"2023-06-28T04:43:05","slug":"u-s-intelligence-agencies-advance-disinformation-about-chinese-spy-base-in-cuba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2023\/07\/u-s-intelligence-agencies-advance-disinformation-about-chinese-spy-base-in-cuba\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Intelligence Agencies Advance Disinformation about Chinese Spy Base in Cuba…"},"content":{"rendered":"

… to Gain Support for Cruel Embargo Costing Cubans $455 Million per Month<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

[Source: worthynews.com]<\/p><\/div>\n

24 Jun 2023 – <\/em>After having lied about WMDs, Russia Gate, chemical weapons in Syria and so many other things, the U.S. intelligence community is now advancing the lie that Cuba is hosting a Chinese spy base that enables China to spy on the U.S.<\/p>\n

The Wall Street Journal<\/em> reported on<\/a> June 8 that China and Cuba had reached an agreement in principle to build an electronic eavesdropping station on the island and that China planned to pay cash-strapped Cuba billions of dollars as part of the negotiations.<\/p>\n

\"A
John Kirby [Source: wikipedia.org<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby, however, said<\/a> in an MSNBC interview that The<\/em> Wall Street Journal<\/em> report was \u201cnot accurate\u201d and that the U.S. was watching Chinese influence activities around the world very carefully.<\/p>\n

An anonymous source familiar with the intelligence says<\/a> it suggests that a deal has been struck in principle but there has not been any movement on building the spy facility.<\/p>\n

\n
\"Cuba's
Carlos Fern\u00e1ndez de Coss\u00edo [Source: todayonline.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fern\u00e1ndez de Coss\u00edo said<\/a> that the slanderous speculation about a Chinese spy base was causing \u201charm and alarm without observing minimum patterns of communication and without providing data or evidence to support what they disseminate.\u201d[1]<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

Mobilizing Support for Regime Change <\/strong><\/h2>\n

The Chinese spy base fabrication is obviously designed to try to mobilize public support for the Biden administration\u2019s regime-change policies.<\/p>\n

Biden\u2019s election had raised expectations<\/a> among many Cubans of a return to the Obama days, when the United States sought to bury the last vestige of the Cold War by restoring diplomatic relations with Havana and calling for an end to the embargo.<\/p>\n

However, when protests broke out early in Biden\u2019s presidency, the Biden administration supported the dissidents<\/a> and doubled down on Donald Trump\u2019s hard-line anti-Cuba policies.<\/p>\n

\"Police
Damage caused by protests in Cuba in July 2021 which the Biden administration supported. [Source: bbc.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It expanded sanctions and the economic embargo of Cuba, which is opposed by 185 countries and, according to Yuri Gala L\u00f3pez, the Ambassador of the Permanent Mission of Cuba to the UN, costs Cubans $455 million per month.<\/p>\n

Obama had argued that making it easier for Americans to travel to Cuba and invest in its nascent private sector stood a better chance of promoting economic and political changes on the island than the more directly confrontational regime-change policy Washington has pursued since the 1960s.<\/p>\n

Biden went along with Obama\u2019s policy though, in 1996 as a U.S. Senator, he had\u00a0supported<\/a>\u00a0tightening the already devastating U.S. embargo on Cuba through the Helms-Burton Act, which was signed into law by President Bill Clinton.<\/p>\n

Fidel Castro called Helms-Burton a \u201cshameful\u201d bill, which paved the way for \u201ceconomic genocide.\u201d In addition to tightening economic sanctions, it increased support<\/a> for Cuban exile groups and made it official U.S. policy to support regime change in Cuba.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Emelia Fernandez, a Cuban American, holds a Cuban flag as she protests against the Helms-Burton Act in Miami on March 16, 1996. [Source: theintercept.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In 2008, Biden\u00a0stated<\/a>\u00a0that he was against \u201clifting the embargo until there is a response to political prisoners\u2014all the things that are wrong with this Castro administration.\u201d<\/p>\n

Besides his own pro-imperialist sensibilities, Biden\u2019s policy shift from Obama reflects the influence of Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Robert Menendez<\/a>,\u00a0the son of Cuban immigrants and an ardent champion of regime-change policies who criticized Obama\u2019s gambit toward Cuba.<\/p>\n

\"A
Cuba hawk. [Source: cubanmiami.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Cruelty of Maximum Pressure Policies<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The cruelty of Menendez\u2019s approach was underscored at an\u00a0International People\u2019s Tribunal on U.S. Imperialism<\/a>\u00a0focused on Cuba on June 10 and 11. See video here<\/a> and here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Organized by an\u00a0array of peace and social justice organizations<\/a>, the hearings aimed to spotlight the pernicious impact of U.S. sanctions functioning as a \u201ckey tool of U.S. imperialism.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A
Yuri Gala L\u00f3pez [Source: twitter.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The first speaker at the hearing, Yuri Gala L\u00f3pez, emphasized the Biden administration was continuing to apply a \u201cmaximum pressure policy\u201d on Cuba inherited from the Trump administration, whose purpose was to cripple its economy in order to facilitate unrest and the eventual overthrow of Cuba\u2019s communist government.<\/p>\n

This strategy has essentially been in place since 1960 following the triumph of the Cuban Revolution led by Fidel Castro, which toppled the U.S.-backed dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista and nationalized Cuba\u2019s economy while advancing land reform and instituting free health care and education.<\/p>\n

\"A
Fidel Castro arriving in Havana after the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959. [Source: historytoday.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

L\u00f3pez cited an April 1960 memorandum by Lester D. Mallory, the Deputy Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs at the time of the Cuban Revolution, which emphasized that, since the majority of Cubans supported Fidel Castro and there was no effective political opposition, the U.S. should try to create economic hardship for the population by denying money and supplies and cutting off trade, which would bring about hunger and desperation and the eventual overthrow of Castro\u2019s government.<\/p>\n

\n
\"undefined\"
Lester D. Mallory [Source: wikipedia.org<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Mallory\u2019s memo provided the basis for U.S. foreign policy toward Cuba that remains essentially unchanged after six decades.<\/p>\n

According to L\u00f3pez, the impact of the U.S. blockade has been devastating in human terms, resulting in material shortages and scarcity designed to sow the seeds of popular dissatisfaction with the Castro and Miguel D\u00edaz-Canel administrations.<\/p>\n

The economic damage from the embargo is at least $154 billion, along with thousands killed in terrorist acts directed largely from U.S. soil.<\/p>\n

Other speakers at the hearing emphasized that the U.S. goal was to punish Cuba for its defiance and establishment of a humane governing structure that serves as an alternative to the inhuman capitalist system.<\/p>\n

In the agricultural sector, because of the blockade, farmers are deprived of needed technologies and have difficulty exporting their products. Transportation is impeded and certain medicines and medical treatments are difficult to obtain. The U.S. even blocked the delivery of respirators following the outbreak of COVID-19.<\/p>\n

\"A
[Source: cubasolidarity.blogspot.com<\/a>]<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Because of a remarkable medical system nevertheless, Cuba has obtained lower infant mortality rates than in the U.S. and parallel life expectancy. This is because of the Cuban government\u2019s investment of its resources in the social and human needs of its people, unlike in the U.S. where neo-liberal austerity is the norm and so much money is invested in the military.<\/p>\n

Cuba\u2019s function as a zone of peace was evident in its recent role in helping to broker<\/a> an important peace agreement in Colombia between the Colombian government and the National Liberation Army (ELN) guerrilla group.<\/p>\n

Cuba has generally been labeled by U.S. administrations as a terrorist state and accused of providing a platform for spycraft and subversion into the U.S. when, in reality, it is the U.S. which has terrorized Cuba for six decades and tried to deliberately impoverish and starve its people in the vain hope that they could achieve the long-held goal of regime change and turn the clock back to the 1950s.<\/p>\n

NOTE:<\/strong><\/p>\n

1. Wang Wenbin, spokesperson for China\u2019s foreign ministry, said\u00a0<\/a>the U.S. is the \u201cglobal champion of hacking and superpower of surveillance,\u201d suggesting U.S. officials spread rumors about the spy base as a \u201ccommon tactic.\u201d \u2191<\/a><\/p>\n

______________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> Jeremy Kuzmarov is Managing Editor of <\/em>CovertAction Magazine and author of four books on U.S. foreign policy, including <\/em>Obama\u2019s Unending Wars (Clarity Press, 2019) and T<\/em>he Russians Are Coming, Again, with John Marciano (Monthly Review Press, 2018). He can be reached at: <\/em>jkuzmarov2@gmail.com<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 covertactionmagazine.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

… to Gain Support for Cruel Embargo Costing Cubans $455 Million per Month – After having lied about WMDs, Russiagate, chemical weapons in Syria and so much more, the U.S. is now advancing the lie that Cuba is hosting a Chinese spy base.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":238204,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[867,244,530,2571,923,1109,70],"class_list":["post-238203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latin-america-and-the-caribbean","tag-anglo-america","tag-china","tag-cuba","tag-official-lies-and-narratives","tag-sanctions","tag-spying","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238203","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=238203"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":238208,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238203\/revisions\/238208"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}