If U.S. changes Cuba policy, Castro and Chávez both lose
By Jorge Castañeda - Special to the Express-News
There is little question that in the field of foreign policy, Latin
America is far from being a priority for the Obama administration. Iran,
Afghanistan, and Pakistan are more pressing. The problem is that the
situation in Latin America is getting complicated, and it is
intersecting with crises in other parts of the world.
Two key issues, which by themselves could be minor, are demanding
Washington's attention because they are part of a broader picture that
includes Latin America but is not restricted to the region. The first
issue is the Honduran mess — there is no other term for it.
The coup that toppled Manuel Zelaya in June was a coup — and wasn't. He
was the president, and he was dumped on a plane and shipped off to Costa
Rica by the military. But no one was jailed, the powers that be in the
country supported his ouster, the scheduled elections have not been
canceled and his overthrow took place because he was seeking to remain
in power indefinitely, though legally.
Once that occurred, his friends — Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, Daniel
Ortega in Nicaragua and, chiefly, the Castro brothers in Cuba — made his
restoration a matter of life and death in Latin America.
The hemisphere's democracies saw no alternative but to align themselves
with the rest in opposing the coup. Rightly so, in part.
Military removals of elected presidents must be opposed. But President
Obama misstepped. Instead of seeking to stake out a different position
from his strange bedfellows, he persisted in aligning the U.S. with them
even as the Cuban intelligence services orchestrated Zelaya's
clandestine re-entry into Honduras and his asylum at the Brazilian Embassy.
The second and far broader issue at stake is what Obama intends to do
about a Latin American left that is more substantively divided, but more
rhetorically united, than ever. This is a left where the hard-line
faction, and parts of the more moderate camp, are acquiring
international commitments that are problematic at best and dangerous at
worst.
Chávez's bark is far worse than his bite, but the latter is not bad,
either. He has purchased enormous amounts of weapons from the Russians,
made huge trade deals with the Chinese and is almost certainly
triangulating financial and commercial deals with Iran, helping it get
around U.N. Security Council sanctions.
What should Washington do? Across-the-board confrontation will lead
nowhere, and "engagement" with Chávez will produce the same results as
with Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad: none whatsoever. Just being nice is
fine, especially since the U.S. has not been so for decades — but
atonement, as justified as it is in the Latin American case, is not a
foreign policy.
Perhaps Obama should pursue a two-track approach, which could actually
work. First, he might truly radicalize U.S. policy toward Cuba: lift the
embargo unilaterally, allow travel by all Americans, normalize
diplomatic relations and settle claims generously. He might also really
crack down on Chávez and friends by demanding an end to the arms race,
to Venezuelan support for opposition groups throughout the hemisphere
and to human-rights violations and infringement of individual freedoms
in Venezuela, as well as calling for a clear break between Chávez and Iran.
Havana and Chávez are closely aligned; Zelaya would never have made it
to the Brazilian embassy in the Honduran capital without Cuban
logistical aid, and Chávez himself would probably not survive
politically or otherwise without the island's security apparatus that
permanently surrounds him.
But an end to the embargo could begin to split apart Havana and Caracas,
and it is probably the only intelligent policy Washington has available
to it. The worst that could happen is that it doesn't work. Is anything
else working?
Jorge Castañeda is Mexico's former foreign minister
If U.S. changes Cuba policy, Castro and Chávez both lose (7 October 2009)
http://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/commentary/63641992.html
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