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<b><big><big><span class="style1">Reflections on Anti-Cuban Terror </span></big></big></b><br>
<span class="style2">by W. T. Whitney Jr.<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2013/whitney080513.html">http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2013/whitney080513.html</a><br>
</span>
<p>Bombs set off near the finish line of the Boston Marathon on April
15 killed three and wounded over 200 people. The metropolitan area
became a virtual war zone. Officials at every level let loose with
doomsday-style retaliatory proclamations. For some, however, the
clamor served to resurrect memories of U.S. terrorism -- against Cuba
for instance -- reminding them that U.S. anti-terrorist verbiage was
full of contradictions.</p>
<p>Almost one year before the Marathon bombings, on April 27, 2012, the
office of a tourist agency in Coral Gables, Florida that promotes
charter flights and legal travel to Cuba was firebombed and destroyed.
A local blogger said of owner Vivian Mannerud: "Too bad she was not
inside the office."</p>
<p>Ms. <a
href="http://www.lawg.org/action-center/lawg-blog/69-general/1196-terrorism-in-miami"
class="style5">Mannerud</a> pointed out recently that, "to this day,
not one elected official -- and in particular, James Cason, mayor of
Coral Gables -- has ever come out to denounce this act of terrorism."
There are still no suspects and few signs of ongoing investigation.
The Boston and Florida situations are very different, and perhaps the
lack of deaths and injuries in the Florida case account for some of the
muted response there. But in the past, even when Cuba and its
supporters were beset with chaos and calamity reminiscent of the Boston
experience, impunity prevailed.</p>
<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orlando_Bosch" class="style5">Orlando
Bosch</a> and <a
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luis_Posada_Carriles" class="style5">Luis
Posada</a> engineered the murderous downing of a fully loaded Cuban
airliner at sea in 1976. Posada also arranged for hotel bombings in
Cuba in 1997. They found safe haven in Florida.</p>
<p>The <a
href="http://monthlyreview.org/2001/11/01/the-united-states-is-a-leading-terrorist-state"
class="style5">U.S. government</a> itself is a purveyor of terrorism.
Its wars, drones, economic sanctions, puppet insurgencies, torture
regimens, and prison abuses terrorize peoples throughout the world.
The United States exports spies and informants and supports the
militarized police forces and national armies of puppet governments.
Terror fostered by the United States aggravates hostilities and swells
enemy ranks. Vicious cycles ensue and conflicts expand. Openings then
multiply for the U.S. government to claim victimization and to
rationalize its own terror attacks.</p>
<p>Cuba, however, stands apart from this deadly interchange seen
elsewhere. Terror strikes in only one direction -- against Cuba.
Cuban sources indicate that U.S.-based terrorists have killed almost
3,500 people over 50 years, either Cubans or friends of Cuba. By
contrast, U.S. military and intelligence officials now and then
reiterate that Cuba represents no military or economic threat to the
United States.</p>
<p>Yet the U.S. government maintains Cuba on its list of state sponsors
of terrorism. Apologists point to Basque separatists welcomed in Cuba
and to sanctuary given leftist Colombian guerrillas. But Spain asked
that Cuba take in the Basques, and Colombia embraced Cuba's offer to
host government negotiations with the guerrillas. So, political refuge
provided for <a
href="http://www.nlg.org/news/announcements/national-lawyers-guild-urges-fbi-respect-political-asylum-status-assata-shakur"
class="style5">Assata Shakur</a> has long been cited. Having escaped
from a U.S. prison, the black liberation combatant moved to Cuba.</p>
<p>The United States recently simultaneously announced that Cuba will
remain on its list of terror-sponsoring states and that, conveniently
enough, Assata Shakur was being placed on the FBI's ten "most wanted
terrorist" list, as well as that the bounty for her capture and return
to the United States was raised to $2 million. Many legal observers,
however, remain highly critical of the prosecution and trial in 1977
through which she was convicted of murdering a New Jersey policeman.</p>
<p>Considering that Cuba is quite blameless, refusing to engage in
tit-for-tat, one may ask: Why have terror attacks against Cuba
continued?</p>
<p>One answer is that the U.S. government, as minder of an empire, is
serious about its duty to counter revolutionary and anti-imperialist
movements from their earliest stirrings to their takings of power and
beyond. U.S. governments have been dealing with Cuban revolutionaries
for almost 150 years. In reaction to anti-annexationist, anti-racist
independence struggles led by Jose Marti and Antonio Maceo, the United
States ended up invading Cuba. U.S. troops helped beat down an
Afro-Cuban uprising in 1912. Then in the early 1930s came Cuban
student and labor mobilizations, anti-imperialist in nature --
harbingers of a socialist revolution that took charge in 1959. Special
treatment for Cuba may stem, in part, from enmity to an
anti-imperialism that never quits.</p>
<p>Cuban anti-imperialism is not all U.S. power brokers have to worry
about. Despite bashings, Cuba poses the threat of a good example. The
socialist state has ensured long life expectancy, low infant mortality,
ready access to high quality education, jobs, adequate nutrition and
housing, and inculcation of ethical, communitarian values and cultural
heritages. Cubans even weather natural disasters in exemplary fashion.
Cuba's adventures in international solidarity add insult to injury.
Beleaguered Cuba <a
href="http://monthlyreview.org/2013/04/01/the-military-defeat-of-the-south-africans-in-angola"
class="style5">contested apartheid in southern Africa</a>, <a
href="http://monthlyreview.org/2012/09/01/cuba-the-new-global-medicine"
class="style5">cares for the sick and injured throughout the world</a>,
and <a
href="http://monthlyreview.org/2011/03/01/the-latin-american-school-of-medicine-today"
class="style5">educates young people from all over</a>.</p>
<p>And annoyingly Cuba defends itself against terror in targeted,
non-violent ways. Cuban volunteers moved to Florida to monitor
U.S.-based terrorists so that Cuba could prepare against attacks and
maybe prevent them. For their pains, the <a
href="http://www.thecuban5.org/" class="style5">Cuban Five</a>, as
they are known, were subjected to a biased trial and long, cruel
sentences. A worldwide movement is demanding that U.S. President Obama
release them.</p>
<p>Because the Five targeted violent private organizations operating
from bases in Florida, their activities and their trial highlighted the
general role of proxy warriors. Use of proxies frees central
authorities from having publically to take responsibility for
state-sponsored terror campaigns. In effect, the Five helped elucidate
similarities among a variety of non-state perpetrators, specifically
between private paramilitary groups in Florida and autonomous terrorist
groups and individuals elsewhere, even those at war with the United
States. That bit of political education may have earned the Cuban Five
a good part of their wildly excessive penalties.</p>
<hr>
<span class="style3">W. T. Whitney Jr., a retired pediatrician, is a
Cuba solidarity activist and member of Veterans for Peace. He writes
on Latin American issues. </span>
<div class="moz-signature">-- <br>
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863.9977
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.freedomarchives.org">www.freedomarchives.org</a>
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