[News] “Sonic Attacks” in Cuba: Who Benefits?

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/10/06/sonic-attacks-in-cuba-who-benefits/


  “Sonic Attacks” in Cuba: Who Benefits?

by John Kirk – Stephen Kimber 
<https://www.counterpunch.org/author/kirkkimb0098/> - October 6, 2017

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Consider this. The United States government doesn’t know who’s 
responsible for the so-called acoustic attacks on its embassy personnel 
in Havana. Then consider this. Cuban president Raúl Castro didn’t simply 
claim his government had nothing to do with the incidents, he did the 
unthinkable and invited the FBI to investigate. FBI agents haven’t been 
able to figure it out. Neither have American acoustics specialists or 
medical experts. Even Canada’s Mounties, whose own diplomats reported 
similar attacks, are stymied.

Despite the fact no one has identified either culprit or cause, the 
Trump administration is pre-emptively creating conflict with Havana. 
Why? And who benefits from that?

On October 3, the State Department announced it was expelling two-thirds 
of Cuba’s Washington embassy personnel, less than a week after it 
announced it was withdrawing sixty per cent of its own diplomats from 
Havana, and warning Americans against traveling there. The department 
called the moves “reciprocity,” but didn’t explain for what, since the 
Cubans haven’t expelled anyone.

The State Department insists it isn’t blaming the Cuban government for 
the attacks; it’s simply trying to protect American diplomats and 
tourists. Ironically, the U.S. Foreign Service Association, representing 
American diplomats around the world, opposes Washington’s directive. So 
do travel companies and airlines ferrying eager American visitors to the 
island in increasing numbers. So presumably do Americans generally, the 
majority of whom support improving relations with Cuba. While over 
600,000 Americans visited Cuba last year, it’s worth noting not one has 
so far complained of symptoms similar to those reported by the diplomats.

Some context may be useful here. Late last year, U.S. diplomats in 
Havana began reporting hearing loud grinding, ringing noises inside 
areas of their homes and experienced the sensation that their bodies 
were vibrating. They claimed to suffer nausea, headaches and hearing 
loss. U.S. government officials now say some have been diagnosed with 
mild traumatic brain injuries. Twenty-one American and at least five 
Canadians diplomats and/or their families have been affected.

In the absence of evidence about who did what and why, media have been 
rife with speculation. At first, the most popular assumption was that 
the Cuban government must be targeting these diplomats. This is now 
considered unlikely, since the first of the so-called attacks occurred 
at a time when bilateral relations were beginning to improve, and Cuban 
president Raúl Castro has consistently favored improving relations with 
the United States.

Likewise, given that Canada and Cuba have traditionally maintained solid 
ties, there would have been little advantage for the Cubans in rocking 
that diplomatic boat.

That led to other theories: “rogue elements” in the Cuban security 
forces; officials inside US intelligence services keen to resort to Cold 
War times; Russians eager to bolster their own relationship with their 
erstwhile ally while sowing discord between the US and Cuba; maybe even 
Donald Trump himself, anxious to deflect attention from his own many 
domestic and international challenges.

We don’t know. And perhaps we never will. Or maybe the truth will only 
be revealed 30 years from now after sufficient time has passed and 
intelligence agencies (from whichever country is involved, /if/  they 
are involved) finally release the pertinent documentation.

So what do we really know?

Well, we certainly know who is already working overtime to twist these 
unexplained events to their ideological advantage: anti-Cuba hawks in 
Washington and Miami. Still nursing their wounds from the Obama 
administration’s 2015 reset on relations with Cuba, they are eager to 
reassert their own hardline views on US policy.

The Trump White House — which has talked tough on Cuba but done 
relatively little so far to scale back actual policy changes implemented 
during the Obama era — seems eager to do the hawks bidding under cover 
of protecting US diplomats.

On Sept. 15, five right-wing Republican Senators, including  virulent 
anti-Cuba Florida Senator Marco Rubio, sent an open letter to Secretary 
Rex Tillerson, asking him to “immediately declare all accredited Cuban 
diplomats in the United States persona non grata and, if Cuba does not 
take tangible action, close the U.S. Embassy in Havana.”

Two days later, Tillerson — who has since come close to putting a full 
checkmark beside their first demand — told CBS the State Department has 
shuttering the embassy “under evaluation… It’s a very serious issue with 
respect to the harm that certain individuals have suffered.”

It is indeed a very serious issue — which is exactly why Washington 
shouldn’t allow its response to be hijacked by baseless arguments of 
self-interested Senators eager to turn back the political clock, and a 
president paying back his political commitments to the wealthy 
Cuban-American lobby.

Over five decades were wasted after the Washington broke diplomatic 
relations with Cuba in 1961.  The reopening of diplomatic relations just 
two years ago was a victory for common sense—but sadly is now in danger 
of being overturned because of self-seeking politics and ignorance.

/*John Kirk* is Professor of Latin American Studies at Dalhousie 
University.  He is the author/coeditor of 16 books on Cuba.  His most 
recent book is Healthcare without Borders: Understanding Cuban Medical 
Internationalism 
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0813061059/counterpunchmaga> (2015), 
and he is the coeditor of “The Evolution of Cuban Foreign Policy under 
Raúl Castro” (to be published in 2018).  For many years he was the 
Editor of the Contemporary Cuba series with the University Press of 
Florida, and is now the Co-editor of the new series on Cuba published by 
Lexington Books./

/*Stephen Kimber *is a Professor of Journalism at the University of 
King’s College in Halifax, CANADA, and the author of nine books, 
including the award-winning What Lies Across the Water: The Real Story 
of the Cuban Five 
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1552665429/counterpunchmaga>./

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