The Atlanta-Journal Constitution . Tuesday, April 25, 2000
House Majority Whip Tom Delay (R-Texas), a relentless Clinton administration critic, vows Congress will hold hearings to question the propriety of the armed, pre-dawn raid to take 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez from the home of his Miami relatives. The honorables could put their time to much
better use re-examining Washington's petrified policy toward Cuba. After 40 years of failure, isn't it time to overhaul it?
Decades ago, when Cuba served as a launch pad for Soviet missiles and springboard for Marxist revolution, Washington's quarantine of the island-nation made sense. These days that strategy is an anachronism.
Cuba is no threat to anyone. Its economy barely provides sustenance for its people. Its infrastructure creaks with age. The only institution that works halfway efficiently is Fidel Castro's repressive internal security operation. Clearly, this is a regime that is running down. How much time
Castro has left
is anybody's guess.
Whether or not he departs the scene soon may not make much difference. Some U.S. analysts worry more about the possibility of a Castro grown senile and making irrational decisions than they do a violent post-Castro struggle for power. Either scenario could lead to bloodshed and a new mass
exodus and thus put pressure on the U.S. government to intervene, an outcome we ought to try to avoid.
Unfortunately, neither this nor any future president has the power to alter U.S. policy significantly toward Cuba or to respond quickly to an emergency there as long as the Helms-Burton law is on the books. President Clinton made a terrible mistake in 1996 in signing this act into law because
it puts legislative and judicial impediments in the way of any turns in U.S. relations with Cuba.
For instance, Helms-Burton would forbid any U.S. aid to a new government in Cuba, even a promising reformist one, unless it paid off decades-old claims of Cuban exiles for properties expropriated by the Castro regime. That, in effect, gives the exile community's most extreme hard-liners veto
power over U.S. efforts to nurture a homegrown representative government in Cuba.
The best way to avoid post-Castro chaos is to lay the groundwork as soon as possible for institutions that will provide some stability beyond Castro --- businesses, private associations, churches, etc. Yet Americans can't even begin to help as long as the U.S. embargo toward Cuba is in
effect, barring investment, trading or most nonbusiness interaction there.
Striking down Helms-Burton has to be the first step toward doing away with the embargo. This being an election year, it's unrealistic to think lawmakers who pander to the exiles or are intimidated by them will move quickly to repeal Helms-Burton. Just the same, thoughtful members of Congress
from both parties, like Sens. Chuck Hegel (R-Neb.) and John Kerry (D-Mass.), are signaling a turn in that direction.
If there is one positive consequence to the Elian Gonzalez saga so far, it is a growing sense our Cuba policy is obsolete and bends over backward to accommodate a tiny but vocal minority. More Americans need to wake up to that realization. |