Cuban entrepreneurs get business training from US, hope Biden lifts sanctions

[Judi Lynn]

4. You might want to consider this piece by Jimmy Carter's man in Havana, in 1982.

Last edited Sun Jul 2, 2023, 04:39 AM - Edit history (1)

I read over 20 years ago his excellent observation:

“Cuba seems to have the same effect on American administrations that the full moon once had on werewolves.”

Bush and Cuba: Still the Full Moon


Wayne S. Smith
September 25, 2007

If I am remembered at all (which isn’t likely), it will probably be for having said in my first op-ed piece in the New York Times after leaving the U.S. Foreign Service back in 1982 that “Cuba seems to have the same effect on American administrations that the full moon once had on werewolves.” Twenty-two years later, that is unchanged. Indeed, as one analyzes the Bush administration’s policies toward Cuba, one imagines a distant (and distinctly irrational) howling!

The cold war is long since over. Our own Pentagon acknowledges that Cuba poses no threat whatsoever to U.S. security. There is no evidence that Cuba is or has been in any way involved with terrorist efforts against the United States. On the contrary, Castro has offered to cooperate fully in the fight against terrorism and even proposed signing agreements to that effect with the United States. But none of that has softened Bush’s approach one bit. Instead, his is the harshest policy yet against the island nation. Bush indeed seems to have entered the White House with the intention of getting rid of the Castro regime, not to negotiate with it or to reach some modus vivendi. As Assistant Secretary of State Roger Noriega put it to Congress on October 2 last year: “The President is determined to see the end of the Castro regime and the dismantling of the apparatus that has kept him in office for so long.”

This past January, Bush closed all channels for dialogue, even suspending the twice-yearly migration talks. He also appointed a Commission for Assistance to a Free Cuba to recommend ways, first, of bringing about “an expeditious end of the dictatorship,” and then to develop a plan for assisting the Cuban people in “a post-dictatorship Cuba.”

For 45 years now, Washington has used pressure and threats against Castro. The embargo has been in place for 44 years, travel controls of one kind or another almost as long. So now Bush simply proposes more of the same, only in strengthened doses.

The first thing that must be said is that it won’t work. It takes us in exactly the wrong direction. There is a hard-and-fast rule that no U.S. administration has understood (or at least accepted): the more we threaten and pressure, the more we try to choke Cuba economically, the more defensive will be the reaction of the Cuban government, and the more it will call for greater internal discipline and for all to rally around the flag against the threat from the Colossus of the North. In other words, it leads not to liberalization but to tighter internal controls. We must remember that since at least 1902, when the Platt Amendment turned Cuba into a U.S. protectorate, Cubans have seen the United States as the principal threat to their sovereignty and independence. They react to our policies accordingly.

More:
https://nacla.org/article/bush-and-cuba-still-full-moon

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Very interesting piece on Wayne Smith, for someone who might like a look at Cuba through the eyes of someone who knows quite a bit about it.



P U B L I C P O L I C Y A N D I N T E R N A T L. A F F A I R S
Candid about Cuba
By Joanne P. Cavanaugh



WAYNE SMITH STEPS INTO A PRIVATE TAXI on a street corner in Havana, the big man folding himself into the back seat. The Cuban taxi driver glances back at his passenger.
"Hola, Wayne Smith," the young man says, growing excited. "You have done so much for Cuba. You are a hero. A donde vamos, Smith? Where are we going?"

Others are asking Smith the same question. In scenes repeated in Cuban cafés, hotel corridors, and along crumbling streets, ordinary Cubans recognize and welcome the burly, bearded ex-Marine. This former top American diplomat in Cuba, and longtime critic of U.S. policy, is well known here. And he is often called upon to predict the country's future by those on both sides of the Florida Straits.

Flash to the Levering cafeteria at Hopkins's Homewood campus. Smith, a Hopkins visiting professor, is eating a quick lunch: spiced curly fries, a fried fish filet, and a hunk of chocolate pie, before he teaches class--Cuba and U.S. Decision-Making: Case Studies. Students and colleagues stop by every 10 minutes. They want to discuss careers in the U.S. Foreign Service, pose a question about Smith's course, or just chat. He nods and smiles, answering them quickly and diplomatically.

Wayne Sanford Smith is a celebrity--with all the controversy that entails for someone who speaks his mind about a topic as emotional as Cuba. During Pope John Paul II's historic visit to Cuba in January, Smith was on hand in Havana for interviews with Good Morning America, The Today Show, CNN, NPR, and a litany of networks, newspapers, and radio stations. In broadcast debates, he sparred with Cuban exile leaders on the U.S. embargo and other policies. He is what's known in the news business as a "quote machine."

In his role as Cuba analyst-- tapped by the press, politicians, academics, and students --Smith often swims against the mainstream. In Op-Ed pieces in newspapers, and in academic and political forums, he calls for dialogue with Castro's government. That can be a volatile position to an outspoken Miami-based Cuban exile community that opposes any deal-making with Castro. It also rankles anti-communist crusaders elsewhere in the United States. A formerly high-ranking diplomat, Smith also brutally criticizes U.S. foreign policy, calling U.S. decisions regarding Cuba-- mostly a series of ever-tightening sanctions--"specious," "irrational," and reaching "new heights of absurdity." Yet he also criticizes Castro and his government, citing restrictions on free speech and other human rights abuses.

More:
https://pages.jh.edu/jhumag/0498web/cuba.html