Cuban leader's dizzy spell leads to talks about the public, diplomatic
and bureaucratic chaos that could erupt 90 miles away
By Dana Canedy. New York Times.
Contra Costa Times. Published
Monday, July 2, 2001
MIAMI -- Hours after images of President Fidel Castro's near collapse
recently while making a speech flashed across television screens, the Miami
Police Department went on alert, bracing for the possibility of a large and
emotional public reaction here if the Cuban leader became incapacitated or died.
Leaders of the Cuban American National Foundation, the powerful exile group,
immediately got on the phone to Havana, trying to contact Cuban government
insiders to offer humanitarian aid and a plea for democracy should there be a
change of power.
And last Monday, Mayor Alex Penelas of Miami-Dade County called a meeting
with officials to review the "Cuba Change in Government" plan in this
county, which is home to 650,000 Cuban-Americans.
No matter that Castro, 74, quickly regained his composure and proclaimed his
fitness after being overcome by the broiling sun in a speech on June 21.
The reaction to his dizzy spell 90 miles away in Miami offers a glimpse of
plans to deal swiftly with the public, diplomatic and bureaucratic turmoil that
Castro's death could cause.
"We've been dealing with this issue all week," Juan Mendieta, the
county spokesman, said last week. "We even held a meeting on Monday with
the emergency management director, the county manager and the mayor to basically
dust off the plan and look over it again."
Local, state and federal contingency plans call for precautions like
increasing security on Miami's streets, limiting boat traffic in and out of
South Florida, and enlisting clergy members and Cuban-American civic and
political leaders to call for calm.
At the command center, coordinating dozens of agencies and exile groups,
will be the county emergency management office, housed in a building on the
north side of Miami.
There, the county contingency plan would be set in motion once the mayor
signs a declaration of emergency in the event of significant civil disturbances
or massive boat movement in or out of South Florida, county officials said.
The command post would be established at the emergency management office to
maintain communications with Cuba, coordinate the agencies, brief the news
media, and keep exiles informed about developments and relatives in Cuba.
"Every local, state and federal agency and department that had a
responsibility would be in our emergency operations center to work on it,"
said Chuck Lanza, director of the Miami-Dade County office of emergency
management.
Some plans would be carried out at sea and in the air, others here in the
city, where an emotional outpouring is expected in the streets.
The top officials of the Miami Police Department would cancel vacations, add
people to all shifts, and dispatch officers to handle crowds at popular spots
for demonstrations and celebrations, Chief Raul Martinez said.
"We would immediately monitor central locations where groups would
demonstrate so that all of a sudden we would not wake up and there would be
10,000 people on the streets," Martinez said.
A heavy police presence would be seen at places with symbolic importance for
Cuban-Americans, including Calle Ocho in Little Havana, site of a big annual
street party, and the Freedom Tower on Biscayne Boulevard, Miami's busiest
downtown street, once a government center where more than half a million exiles
were processed.
"People are going to hit the streets to celebrate, either pedestrians
or in their cars; the real danger is you have them both in the same spot,"
Martinez said. "There are probably going to be some major traffic
disruptions, and we're probably going to shut down some streets."
The Coast Guard's plan focuses on another potential traffic problem -- a
huge increase in boats and rafts heading to or from Cuba.
"We would increase the presence of our cutters and aircraft in the
event that that does materialize," said Luis Diaz, a spokesman for the
Coast Guard in Miami.
The county plan also deals with departing sea traffic. "We could
potentially see a situation where numerous people grab boats that have been
sitting in their back yards for a number of months or years, and take them to a
marina and decide to venture down to Cuba to pick relatives up, celebrate or
reclaim property," said Mendieta, the county spokesman. "One of the
things we can do under the plan is close the marinas."
To discourage civil unrest, the leaders of the city of Miami and of
Miami-Dade County would meet with members of the clergy and exile groups to
organize rallies at large sites like the Orange Bowl, steering people away from
the streets.
Cuban-American civic leaders would go on radio and television stations to
urge calm.
"The foundation would be the first one to tell everybody, 'Don't take
one boat out until the situation stabilizes,'" said Pepe Hernandez,
president of the Cuban American National Foundation, which has its own
contingency plan.
One element of it, Hernandez said, has been under way for several years, as
organization leaders and strategists have been in regular contact with sources
in Cuba, some of them government insiders, in hope of influencing a move toward
democracy when Castro's 42-year control of the island ends.
"We have been for some time conducting communications to give them
assurances that what we want is a peaceful transition to democracy and that we
want to secure the lives of all of them," Hernandez said.
After Castro's dizzy spell, Hernandez said, "We received a number of
calls during the night, and we spent a good portion of the next day on those
issues."
But with Castro's 70-year-old brother, Raul Castro, the Cuban defense
minister, widely considered his likely successor, not much is expected to change
for exiles here even after Fidel Castro is gone.
U.S. law prohibits full diplomatic and trade relations with Cuba as long as
it remains under Communist control.
Local and state officials declined to discuss some details of plans for
safety and strategic reasons.
And federal officials were reluctant even to acknowledge the existence of
contingency plans, saying the plans were either classified or diplomatically
sensitive.
A State Department official who did not want to be named initially said no
such plan existed, but when told details of preparations some Florida lawmakers
had been briefed on, he said the information was classified.
"We have a lot of contingency plans up here that are classified and
unclassified about what would happen," said U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen,
a Republican from Miami and the chairwoman of the subcommittee on International
Operations and Human Rights.
"One thing we would probably do is cordon off the island so that no
U.S. ship bound for Cuba can go there so you have a Mariel in reverse," she
said, referring to the Cuban boat exodus in 1980.
U.S. Rep. Porter Goss, a Republican from Sanibel, on the Florida Gulf, and
chairman of the Select Committee on Intelligence, said that Castro's death would
call for "an executive branch response" and that the government had a
plan of action.
"Is there a contingency plan? Yes," Goss said. "Does a
contingency plan guarantee success? No. This would be a very huge, passionate
moment in history for a lot of our citizens in southeast Florida, and the idea
of putting a traffic cop up to say 'Stop' is just not going to happen."
| 
