| Dear Supporter, There have been a lot of things bubbling out of the Obama Administration this November surrounding Cuba policy. A few weeks ago, President Obama spoke at a fundraising event in Miami in which he stated, “We have to be creative and we have to be thoughtful and we have to continue to update our policies [towards Cuba].” The President even went further and recognized the obsolete nature of our current Cuba policy, “Keep in mind that when Castro came to power I was just born, so the notion that the same policies that we put in place in 1961 would somehow still be as effective as they are today in the age of the Internet, Google and world travel doesn't make sense." Then last Monday, Secretary of State John Kerry spoke at the Organization of the American States here in Washington, DC saying that while current U.S. policy towards Cuba strives to promote people-to-people exchanges with members of civil society in Cuba, the U.S. government still wishes to see more changes from the Cubans in terms of promoting democracy on the island. While there are some notions from both the President and Sec. Kerry’s speeches that a possible re-evaluation of our policy could happen, the fact still remains that for over a half-century, U.S. foreign policy toward Cuba has been in single-minded pursuit of one goal: ending the Castro government. But while the majority of U.S. citizens and Cuban Americans want to see a policy of engagement towards Cuba, the Administration has only taken small steps in that direction. In order to help highlight the majority of public opinion in favor of engaging Cuba, rather than isolating them, our friends from the Center for Democracy in the Americas in collaboration with Tracey Eaton developed two short documentaries explaining current opinion of U.S. policy towards Cuba from a Cuban perspective as well as a U.S. perspective. In their first video “Diplomacy Derailed” it’s clear from the multiple opinions that U.S. policy hasn’t worked. Cubans who spoke to CDA on camera – an academic, two artists, and an opposition activist – explain why attacks on Cuba’s sovereignty and nationalism are doomed, arguing that they rally Cubans to their government’s side. 
CDA’s second video “Failure Compounded” dives into the lengths to which our government goes to carry out a regime-change motivated policy by creating programs through USAID. Outside of Cuba, USAID openly conducts its programs with the consent of host governments. Because its activities, funded under the Helms-Burton law, have regime change as their goal, operating openly is not an option in Cuba. Consequently, development workers paid by non-government organizations or private corporations, who secretly bring extremely sensitive high-technology communications equipment into the country, must operate “in a semi-clandestine way,” as analyst Phil Peters explains. So while the Administration may be on a path towards engaging Cuba, both of these videos show the need for meaningful transparency and accountability in U.S. foreign policy. Only when both Cuba and the United States can dialogue without preconditions will real progress be made in our policy. Watch the videos from CDA here and share with your friends. They are a great resource for summarizing issues facing current policy towards Cuba.
Best, The LAWG Cuba Team
Mavis, Emily and Noah |
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