The Next Leader Of Cuba?

Miguel Diaz-Canel with Cuban President Raoul castro. Foto Desmond Boylan/Reuters/Público

Miguel Diaz-Canel, Cuba’s New No. 2, Respected As Smart And Personable -- McClatchy News

Miguel Diaz-Canel, who stands to become Cuba’s first post-Castro ruler, is respected as a smart manager and personable communicator who rode a bike on his rounds when he headed the Communist Party in the province of Villa Clara.

Diaz-Canel toed the revolutionary line and was “something of an ideologue, but he was smart and you could talk to him,” said one of two Cuban journalists in Miami who knew the now 52-year-old in the 1990s and early 2000s.

“He won the respect of the people in the province” of Villa Clara, said the other. Both asked for anonymity because of their current jobs. Diaz-Canel was selected Sunday as first vice president of the Council of State, making him No. 2 in the government headed by Raúl Castro, who announced at the same time that he would leave power in 2018.

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My Comment: He reminds me of Gorbachev .... put into a position of power to reform a system that is inherently bankrupted.

What Is Next For Cuba If Chavez Dies

As Hugo Chavez Fights For His Life, Cuba Fears For Its Future -- The Telegraph

Venezuela is not the only Latin American nation that is monitoring every moment of president Hugo Chavez's illness. His ally Cuba has relied on him for economic help, and that could soon come to an end.

Away from the constitutional wrangles and impassioned crowds of Caracas, the future of Venezuela after Hugo Chavez is being plotted this weekend in an elegant pre-revolutionary mansion in Havana's old playboy quarter.

The firebrand Venezuelan president is fighting for his life in a nearby hospital, stricken by severe respiratory problems and a lung infection after his latest round of surgery for cancer.

His illness left him unable to be sworn in for his fourth term as president last Thursday, having won a close-fought election in October.

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My Comment: Cuba will survive .... and so will Venezuela. But the Castro brothers are old, and the grip of the Communist Party will diminish when they are gone. As for Venezuela .... like most countries who are about to lose their 'strongman' .... even more instability and unrest.

Travel Restrictions Are Now Eased For Cubans

Times Are A-Changin' In Havana -- Walter Mayr, Spiegel Online

A new law easing travel restrictions goes into effect on the Caribbean island of Cuba on Jan. 14. With tentative reforms, the Castro regime is preparing for the 55th anniversary of the country's revolution. A sea change is already on the horizon in the capital Havana.

The first building on Havana's seaside promenade, Malecón 13, lies between the old city and the ocean.

It's still inhabited. Behind a crumbling façade, there is an open passageway, with rusty iron bars under a starry sky, the sounds of salsa music and the clattering of plates. The back of the building faces Calle San Lázaro, with its opulent but decaying colonial buildings. Residents hoping to avoid the threat of being crushed to death by crumbling caryatids on the open street can duck into Los Borrachos, a local rum bar.

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My Comment: This is a major development. When the Soviet Union started to permit it's citizens to travel abroad, this produced a seismic change in people's altitudes within the Soviet Union. They saw how other people lived abroad, and when they came back they started to demand the same thing. I should know .... I am one of those travelers.

This is what I predict will also happen in Cuba. It's one thing to see on TV how other people lived, but when Cubans start to travel and witness what life is really like elsewhere, they will be demanding the same thing when they get back home .... and if they do not get it, even the Castro brothers will have trouble containing that hunger and need for that type of change.

Is The Cuban Government Murdering It's Dissidents

Oswaldo Payá 'inspired countless democracy advocates', says the Cuba Study Group, which encourages reform. Photograph: Enrique De La Osa/Reuters

Who Killed Cuban Dissident Oswaldo Payá? -- Carl Gershman, Washington Post

With the death of Oswaldo Payá, a key leader of the Cuban democratic opposition, Cuba has suffered what the writer Yoani Sanchez called “a dramatic loss for its present and an irreplaceable loss for its future.” The circumstances surrounding Payá’s death Sunday have sparked controversy similar to that caused in October by the death of Laura Pollan , the leader of the much-acclaimed Ladies in White, just weeks after she was attacked at a protest march by a government supporter.

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My Comment: Growing up in Russia (then the Soviet Union) the media always portrayed Cuba as a worthwhile ally that needed the help of the Soviet Union .... but of course everyone in the Soviet Union (yours truly also) were deeply skeptical of this praise. When the Soviet Union broke up, the brutality of Castro's regime and the multi-billions that the Soviet Union gave to such a dictator became public. Murdering opponents and dissidents has always been a Castro trademark .... and while I do not know if they had ordered the murder of Oswaldo Payá .... I would not be surprised if they did.

A Look At The Hit Squads And The Operations That They Conducted For Castro

The Hit Teams That Carried Out Castro’s Vendettas -- Miami Herald

In an excerpt, the first of three, from his new book, ‘Castro’s Secrets: The CIA and Cuba’s Intelligence Machine,’ Brian Latell a retired CIA agent now with the University of Miami, discloses Castro's hit squads.

Assassination operations had always been Fidel’s personal bailiwick. None could be conducted that he did not authorize and help plan. The means for carrying out this most sinister of secret Cuban capabilities were always decentralized and rigidly compartmentalized. It was not scruples that concerned Fidel but the need for airtight deniability.

The Cubans used DGI-controlled illegals, surrogates of other nationalities, as executioners. They carried out some of the most sensitive missions overseas, especially against high-visibility, well-protected targets. Death squads drawn from Latin American terrorist and revolutionary groups beholden to Cuba could be relied on, deniability compounded by degrees of separation. Carefully screened, the foreign assassins were trained at secret Cuban bases, learning to kill in gangland-style hits, elaborately orchestrated paramilitary operations, commando strikes and sly poisonings.

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My Comment: I expect even more info/intel/leaks to be released from Cuba itself after the Castro brothers are dead and buried in the ground.

After 50 Years Of Communism, Cuba Changes Course

Raul Castro addresses the audience during the National Assembly in Havana. © REUTERS/ Enrique De La Osa

Panic, Anger As Cuba Plans To Lay Off 1 Of Every 10 Workers -- McClatchy News

MIAMI — Cuba’s draconian plan to lay off 10 percent of its workforce is running into a slew of problems — not the least of which are the growing fights over who will wind up on the street.

Cuban and foreign economists say it’s too much, too fast.

Radical leftists are branding Raúl Castro as a capitalist exploiter of workers and – in an odd alignment with Cuban dissidents – are urging workers to fight the job cuts.

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More News On Cuba's Change In Economic Policies

Castro layoff plan has even the left furious -- Miami Herald
Cuban president says economic changes will help sustain socialism -- CNN
Raul Castro says Cubans must back economic reforms -- BBC
Raul Castro says Cubans must back economic reforms -- BBC
Cuba sees 3.1 pct growth in 2011, end to bank crisis -- Reuters
Cuba to Remove All Payment Holds in 2011 for Foreign Suppliers -- CRIEnglish
Raul Castro touts economic changes -- AP
President Raul Castro Says Future of Cuban Revolution at Stake -- Latin American Herald Tribune

My Comment: Too little .... way too late. These"reforms" reminds me of the reforms that Gorbachev tried to introduce in the late 1980s in the Soviet Union. They were also too little, and way too late. Three years later, the Soviet Union was no more.

While I do not expect revolution to occur in Cuba, I do see a rising business class that will be effective in instituting more realistic economic and political reforms when the Castro brothers are gone. I give it 5 more years.

Is There A Power Struggle In Cuba?

A Power Struggle For Cuba's Future? -- Spiegel Online

Cuban President Raul Castro has begun releasing 52 imprisoned dissidents. Is this the hoped-for signal of liberalization? Critics of the regime do not believe that a sea change is in the works. Instead, they fear it is just a tactical move designed to weaken the opposition.

The meeting point is in a rundown apartment building on an arterial road in southeast Havana, a place where tourists don't go. The plaster is peeling from the walls, the windowpanes are cloudy and the wooden window frames are crumbling. There are no signs on the doors and no mailboxes. Even the rusty sign that reads "Ernesto Che Guevara" has seen better days and is missing a corner.

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My Comment: Is There A Power Struggle In Cuba? Short answer .... no. I have heard this same story repeated numerous times since the early 1980s .... starting when Castro emptied his prisons and forcing his inmates to go to Florida during the Mariel boatlift. The people who are at the top of this regime have a vested interest to continue the policies and actions of the Cuban government and have ZERO interest to change .... why should they give up on the perks and privilege that power gives to them but giving it to the people who oppose them.

Talk of a power struggle that will result in a change in Cuban policy mainly comes from those who have been supportive of Castro and his government from abroad .... I call it wishful thinking .... but it is this same wishful thinking that I have been hearing for decades (including this Spiegel article) .... and probably will continue to hear in the years to come.

Cuba Is Getting Ready For An American Invasion (Seriously)

Fidel and his brother Raul Castro (Photo from Merco Press).

Cuba: Military Exercise Braces Island For US Attack -- Breitbart/AFP

Nearly 50 years after a botched US-directed invasion of Cuba, the communist nation said Saturday it is holding a military exercise next week to boost preparedness against any future US attack.

"It is a necessity of the first order given the political-military situation that now defines relations between Cuba and the empire," Major General Leonardo Andollo warned, referring to the United States.

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My Comment: I read this post and I could not help but shake my head. Being a person who was brought up understanding Communism (i.e. my Russian nationality helps) I find it hilarious and sad to see this completely outmoded way of thinking still percolating as every day life in the minds of the Cuban Government.

Aside from the American left and those South American "Castro" wannabes that still believe this propaganda, the Cuban people will now have to be dragged out onto the streets (or jungles) to conduct this farcical military exercise to show solidarity and support for the Cuban revolution .... while sticking a finger at the imperialist Yankees And President Obama.

Sighhh .... more bread and circuses.

Cuba's Raúl Castro As Ruthless As Fidel

The Castro Brothers

From Miami Herald:

A report by Human Rights Watch paints Raúl Castro's regime in Cuba as little more than a continuation of his brother's `abusive laws and institutions.'

Cuba's government remains as repressive under Raúl Castro as it was under his brother Fidel, according to the first in-depth report on the island's human rights since the younger Castro took power.

Titled ``New Castro, Same Cuba,'' the report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) details a skein of cruel pressures on dissidents, relatives and friends that belie initial hopes Raúl Castro would be different.

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My Comment: Fidel had many of his opponents executed or thrown in prison, and the rest (about 3 million) kicked out .... and his brother is worse?!?!?!

US Keeps Cuba On Terrorism Blacklist

Brothers Raúl and Fidel Castro

From AFP:

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States announced Thursday it has retained communist Cuba on a list of countries that allegedly support terrorism.

The State Department report lumping Cuba with Iran, Syria and Sudan was released weeks after US President Barack Obama made overtures to Havana, which is under a decades-old embargo, by lifting curbs on travel and money transfers.

Despite keeping Cuba on the blacklist, the report also highlighted positive steps taken by the government in Havana.

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My Comment: Same supporters of Cuba may not be enthralled with this designation, but Cuba's support of FARC has not endeared itself to many of its neighbors. While Colombia has been successful in crippling the organization, Cuba's open support for this group has only made the suffering to last longer.

U.S. Keeps An Eye On Fidel Castro's Shaky Health

Photo: Fidel Castro as seen on November 18, 2008, during a visit from China's President Hu Jintao. AFP / AFP/GETTY IMAGES

From The Miami Herald:

Fidel Castro's public absences have elevated unconfirmed reports of a grave illness. U.S. officials acknowledged that they were aware of the reports.

Cuba watchers from Miami to Washington were on high alert Tuesday, amid widely circulating but vague reports that Fidel Castro's health had taken a serious turn for the worse.

While recognizing that this kind of speculation happens periodically -- most recently in August 2007 -- those who deal with Washington on a regular basis say authorities aren't taking it lightly.

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My Comment: Even when he dies .... nothing much is going to change in Cuba. The Communist Party will still rule the country, and it will still exploit and suppress its people.

Chavez: Castro Unlikely To Appear In Public Again

From Yahoo News/AP:

CARACAS, Venezuela – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Sunday it is unlikely that ailing former Cuban leader Fidel Castro will ever appear in public again.

"That Fidel in his uniform who walked the streets and towns late at night, hugging the people, won't return," Chavez said during his Sunday television and radio program. "That will remain in memories."

He did not discuss the 82-year-old Castro's current medical condition or say why he thought Castro would not return to the public stage.

Chavez has continued to meet occasionally with his friend Castro in private since the former Cuban leader underwent emergency intestinal surgery about 2 1/2 years ago. Castro was last seen in public on July 26, 2006, at a celebration in eastern Cuba.

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