Notorious criminals have enjoyed a free existence on American soil.
By Shane QuinnGlobal Research
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For
60 years the Cuban Revolution has been in opposition to the most
powerful nation of all time. America is a landmass almost 100 times
larger in size than Cuba, is infinitely wealthier, stronger and boasts
the largest and most advanced military on earth. There has hardly been a
more unequal battle in world history than that of America against Cuba,
yet the latter has taken the blows and is still standing.
Consecutive
United States governments – dating to the Dwight D. Eisenhower
administration of the late 1950s – were left increasingly perplexed and
enraged by their country’s inability to either assassinate Fidel Castro or upend the Revolution.
US
governments have implemented a range of attacks against Cuba in the
form of a six-decade old embargo, an illegal invasion, artillery and gun
assaults, chemical and biological warfare, employment of Cuban exile
mercenaries and infamous figures like Luis Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch (image
on the right, source is Havana Times). Little of this receives even
passing mention in common discourse on American-Cuban relations.
Posada
and Bosch gained a sprinkling of notoriety as architects of the October
1976 destruction of a Cuban airliner, killing all 73 people aboard,
including many teenagers. The CIA “had concrete advance intelligence”
months prior to the attack but did nothing to prevent it. Perhaps this
is not surprising, as Posada enjoyed extensive work as a CIA agent,
while Bosch was also utilized as an American intelligence operative and
had contact with the CIA dating to the early 1960s.
The
Cuban airplane atrocity is merely the iceberg’s tip, so to speak;
Posada and Bosch were responsible for countless other murderous acts
across the Western Hemisphere, executed with the use of assault rifles,
machine guns, revolvers, bombs, grenade launchers, a bazooka, etc.
Indeed,
Posada and Bosch were two of the biggest international terrorists of
the post-1945 age. During their long reign of terror they were protected
by powerful American politicians, such as the Bush family. In the late
1980s, future presidential candidate Jeb Bush intervened directly on
Bosch’s behalf, so as to allow this mass murderer to remain unhindered
on American soil.
Bosch was thereafter granted US residency, and in July 1990 he was pardoned of all charges by US president George H. W. Bush,
partly due to lobbying by his son Jeb. In April 2011, Bosch would die
unmolested in Miami aged 84, surrounded by the Cuban-American mafia who
call the area home.
Last
May, the 90-year-old Posada also died a free man in Miami, and was
never charged for his vast array of criminality. It is likely that many
of Miami’s residents, along with visiting holidaymakers, have been
entirely unaware of these terrorists walking uninhibited on the city’s
fair streets.
Posada,
who in the mid-1960s received training at the US Army post Fort
Benning, had furthermore been shielded by George W. Bush’s
administration earlier this century. Posada was granted sanctuary from
America’s highest office while, in Guantanamo Bay, prisoners were held
and tortured on far lesser charges, and others on mere suspicion.
Previously, for a time in the mid-1970s, Bosch himself received
additional guardianship in Chile under the US-instituted Augusto Pinochet dictatorship, and “lived quietly as an artist” in the South American country.
When Cuban leader Fidel Castro was questioned about these grotesque affairs over a decade ago, he replied,“Posada Carriles and his accomplice Orlando Bosch are the most bloodthirsty exponents of imperialist terrorism against our nation. They have carried out dozens of horrific actions in numerous countries within the hemisphere, including even the territory of the United States. Thousands of Cubans and some citizens of other countries have lost their lives and been mutilated, as a consequence of those cowardly and abominable acts by governments of the United States”.
Castro
also notes that Posada and Bosch have “always acted under the orders of
American administrations and their special services, and have been
illegally exonerated of all charges and possible punishment… Posada
Carriles’ terrorist acts, including the bombings of tourist hotels in
Havana and the assassination plans, have been financed by the United
States through the unfortunately famous Cuban-American National
Foundation, since its creation by Reagan and Bush in 1981. All of the
money came from the United States. No one has ever acted with more
deceit and hypocrisy”.
Elsewhere,
those criticizing Cuba for “human rights violations” fail to put into
context unprecedented threats the island nation has faced for decades,
and continues to endure.
Should
small counter-revolutionary cells present on Cuban territory (often
covertly supported by the US) enact methods that undercut the socialist
project, then the issue must surely be dealt with. The Revolution would
simply never have lasted unless actions are taken to counter the
subversive cliques.
In
the majority of cases, Castro’s government handed out moderate prison
sentences to the accused – which are then sometimes commuted – with the
detainees upon release allowed to leave the country, many of course
departing to America. In addition systematic acts of torture, widespread
elsewhere, have not been committed within post-1959 Cuba.
For
the meantime, should those few anti-socialist groups in Cuba begin
their activities without government measures in response, the
individuals would then become emboldened. In such a scenario, Washington
inevitably senses blood while disingenuously announcing their concern
for “democracy and human rights”, with the press leaping aboard the
bandwagon.
Such
cases have been witnessed elsewhere, in Iran last year and Venezuela
recently, when protest marches were pounced upon by the White House and
mass media. The fact that in Venezuela its president, Nicolás Maduro,
has three times the number of people marching in support of him, by
comparison to Washington stooge Juan Guaidó, receives smaller notice.
Unless
swift action is initiated by Cuba’s government in response to the
counter-revolutionary plans, America may gain a bridge hold in the
country – as the superpower has succeeded in doing so with regard
Venezuela and various other sovereign states, repeatedly violating the
UN Charter. In Indonesia during the mid-1960s, direct US involvement
enabled the Western-backed General Suharto and his forces to kill around
a million people, rivalling Stalin’s purges.
In
reports concerning Cuba conducted by often well regarded NGOs like
Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch (HRW), they have
consistently failed to take into account the extraordinary extent of
hostility towards the Caribbean island. Amnesty and HRW have undertaken
some good work in other regions, but one must remember that the former
is headquartered in London and the latter in New York. For this case,
much of the Western NGOs’ coverage bears the hallmarks of having been
skewed by years of blanket propaganda against Cuba, engineered by
American and British institutions.
Moreover,
Amnesty and HRW have betrayed an unfortunate tendency to focus on
“pro-democracy activists” within Cuba, the most prominent of those this
century being the so-called “Ladies in White”. The Ladies in White are
in actual fact a US-funded proxy group. In August 2011 Wikileaks cables –
which are invariably accurate – revealed that the Ladies in White have
links to US government organizations. Despite such realities, Amnesty
and HRW have continued to champion their motives in the name of “human
rights”.
In
2018, HRW described the Ladies in White as “founded by the wives,
mothers and daughters of political prisoners” – while Amnesty in their
2017/2018 analysis on Cuba outlined them as “a group of female relatives
of prisoners detained on politically motivated grounds”. In these
accounts, not a word has been written relating to the Ladies in White
and their ties to American governments, or indeed the Wikileaks
documents.
When claims of human rights breaches were put to Castro in an interview earlier this century, he responded that,
“The life expectancy of Cuban citizens is now almost 18 years longer than in 1959, when the Revolution came to power. We have made universal literacy possible, made it possible for every child to go to school, made it possible for every citizen to get an education. In the fields of education and health, there’s no country in the Third World, or even in the developed capitalist world, that’s done what we’ve done in those areas, for the good of the people”.
In relation to societal problems seen around the world, including in wealthy consumer nations, Castro highlighted that in Cuba,
“Begging and unemployment have been eradicated. Drug use and gambling have also disappeared. You won’t find children begging in the streets; we don’t have homeless beggars here… And I won’t go on too long about the aid we’ve given to dozens of countries in the Third World. There are Cuban doctors in over 40 countries, and they’ve saved thousands of human lives”.
Following the April 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in northern Ukraine, Castro further outlined that,
“We’ve given free treatment to thousands of children from Chernobyl that no other country took in. I don’t think any place in the world has equalled the generosity to human beings that’s been shown by Cuba. And this is the country that people want to condemn for violations of human rights? Only through lies and calumnies can such profoundly dishonest accusations be made”.
Over
elapsing years from the Chernobyl catastrophe, Cuba has now treated
over 26,000 victims, more than 80% of whom are children.
Meanwhile,
in August 2005, immediately after Hurricane Katrina laid waste to wide
sections of America’s south-east, Cuba was among the first to offer
medical assistance to the US – in the form of over 1,500 doctors along
with dozens of tons of supplies. This act of generosity was forthcoming
despite decades of the above-mentioned attacks. Hugo Chavez’ Venezuela
was also quick in offering aid to America during the hurricane’s
aftermath.
Both
lifelines were rejected in silence by the Bush administration, who were
loath to accept humanitarian relief from socialist governments they
were seeking to undermine and overthrow. Had Cuban and Venezuelan
support been welcomed by president Bush – sluggish himself in responding
to the crisis and whose country was notably short of doctors – many
lives like those lost in New Orleans would likely have been saved.
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Shane Quinn obtained
an honors journalism degree. He is interested in writing primarily on
foreign affairs, having been inspired by authors like Noam
Chomsky. He is a frequent contributor to Global Research.
Featured image is from New Eastern Outlook.
