".... the sensation of
fulfilling the most sacred of duties: fighting against
Imperialism wherever it is…. "Che
A
thousand-faced monster called the CIA Dr.
Néstor García Iturbe – October 22, 2009
A CubaNews translation. Edited by Walter Lippmann.
(Spanish original below.)
As
part of the CIA’s efforts to overthrow the Cuban Revolution is a new
thing called “Freedom Socialist Party”,
which last October 19 published an article titled Cuba’s fate:
balanced on a razor’s edge, signed by one Susan Williams.
The operation includes a number of mutually complementing covert actions
primarily designed to torpedo the Cuban revolutionary process with a
view toward a so-called “transition” and the establishment in the Island
of a government that follows to the letter what instruction comes from
the U.S. We will deal with this operation at a later date, as now I
would like to refer specifically to these Actions.
It’s the kind considered by the CIA as “diversionary”. While the author
claims to be worried about Cuba’s fate and makes a pretense of being
revolutionary, the article is aimed mainly at recruiting individuals
who, without being opposed to the Revolution, are somewhat averse to
some of the decisions made by the Cuban government and keep complaining
about our current difficulties. These are mostly brought about by the
strict blockade that the U.S. has set up against us. These elements try
to capitalize on the objective, necessary improvement-oriented criticism
regularly promoted by the Revolution itself through the Communist Party,
the mass organizations and the overall state apparatus.
It’s about creating a faction whose members can act as “spokespersons”
on behalf of those who prefer to use this new institution rather than
the established channels to voice their various grudges.
The article starts out by saying that “the Cuban people have
valiantly defended their goal of socialism against economic, political
and military pressure”,a good opener that leads the
revolutionary readers to lower their guard and welcome the message as a
whole. Beginning with an objective truth probably helps take in the lies
that follow.
Another message, also intended to reinforce the reader’s positive
reception of what comes next, appears in the second paragraph: “How
much longer can the island stave off capitalism’s return?”
What lies behind this article becomes clear by the third paragraph,
which mentions steps to protect the gains of the Revolution from the
threat of capitalist restoration in Cuba. According to the author, the
reason for this involution is that “the bureaucracy headed
by Raúl Castro is accelerating in the
wrong direction.” Here begin the attacks on
the Cuban Revolution and particularly on comrade Raúl, our president.
It’s the same message sent by the U.S. intelligence services when they
have tried to set in motion what they describe as “transition”,
basically the same as in the so-called “Bush plan for a free Cuba” back
when comrade Fidel was in charge. As per these gentlemen, all those who
fight for our sovereignty and independence and defend the Cuban people’s
rights go “in the wrong
direction.”
Further on
the article takes to praising everything the Revolution has done in the
last few years, again to try and get the reader’s attention. once the
“seed” of discord has been sown. It revisits the style of blaming what
they tag “bureaucracy” for our hardships, saying our people were never
the makers of crucial decisions, but “a
bureaucracy politically similar to Stalin’s regime in the USSR, although
it never installed the bloody police state that Stalin did.”
This new attack on
“bureaucracy” overlooks our people’s involvement in the most important
decisions made in Cuba and casts sly doubt on our electoral system, the
one that elects the people’s representatives to our National Assembly,
where they discuss the laws and policies governing the fate of our
nation. Any reference to Stalin’s regime in the former USSR is totally
unfortunate and placed in the wrong context, a fact our people have
repeatedly confirmed.
Even the Communist Party of Cuba is accused of being treacherous and
Stalinist, a charge the author bases on the old Trotskyist theory that
it’s not possible to make a revolution in a single country.
No mention is made of the time at this stage of the Revolution when Cuba
was left almost completely isolated following the collapse of the
socialist countries and we had to do everything we could to save the
revolutionary state. The intention is to disregard the dialectical
development of revolutionary struggle in Latin America and how it’s
taking place these days without acknowledging Cuba’s role in fighting
the main enemy and its solidarity with Latin American and other
governments now seeking full independence and holding a position of
confrontation, or at least sovereign, vis-à-vis the United States.
In reference to the world scene and particularly to the political
situation in Latin America, criticism is leveled at Chávez and other
rulers who defend the interests of their peoples, including the
Bolivarian Alliance for Our America (ALBA). These statements are on a
par with others that members of the Obama administration make every day
against the progress of independence on the continent, no different from
those of the “opposition” organized and funded by NED and USAID, who are
in charge of distributing the money delivered by the CIA.
One of the last paragraphs demands that the Communist Party of Cuba
allow internal factions, an idea the author ascribes to two of her
followers. Obviously, the enemies of the Revolution deem our Party’s
unity a major strength, hence their efforts to create dissension in our
midst. This alerts us to the need of making our Party work stronger to
preserve internal democracy, unity of action and democratic centralism.
The article ends with an appeal for the support of the “advocates of
socialist workers’ democracy within Cuba” and the “building of a
revolutionary U.S. movement powerful enough to win an egalitarian
society in the heartland of imperialism.”
This final note reflects the CIA’s attempts through some of its
campaigns to give the wrong impression that our workers, peasants, black
people and women live in a state of repression and lack of opportunity.
Anyone who knows nothing about Cuba might believe all this, but it’s
just the image our enemies try to portray in order to divide our people.
That this is their real purpose is clearly shown in the actions of the
self-appointed “dissident” groups, which are a perfect match for the
spirit of Susan Williams’ article.
The CIA is a thousand-faced monster that shows up everywhere under a
variety of costumes to spread ideas and plant agents who, in this case,
go so far as to dress up as revolutionaries in order to win the support
of the unwary and turn them into traitors to their homeland.
It’s so easy to spot, the CIA: when it states its goals, stands up to
any true-blue revolutionary or has recourse to the worn-out campaigns it
has orchestrated in the last times, THERE’S THE MONSTER!
================ Nestor García Iturbe, born in Havana in 1940.
Doctor in Historical Science. B.A. in Political Science, Author of
various books. Represented Cuba at the U.N. as Counsellor of the Cuban
Permanent Mission from 1974 to 1988. Professor at the Instituto Superior
de Relaciones Internacionales, MINREX, Havana.
Cuba's fate: balanced on a
razor's edge
Susan Williams, M.D.
October 2009
For five decades, the
Cuban people have valiantly defended their goal of socialism against
economic, political and military pressure. Today, however, their
revolution is in danger as never before.
With an economy that's been on life support since the 1990s, Cuba is
trying to survive the current global crisis while it copes with $10
billion in damage caused by last year's hurricanes. In these
circumstances, how much longer can the island stave off capitalism's
return?
Therearesteps
that could be taken within Cuba to protect the gains of the 1959
revolution until workers' victories in other countries make mutual aid
possible. But the bureaucracy headed by Raúl Castro is accelerating in
thewrong direction,
sharpening the threat of capitalist restoration and the need for a
180-degree change of course.
At risk: all the revolution has gained.The
stakes are great - for Cuba, and for the rest of the world. Generations
have been inspired by seeing what's possible when the profiteers are
sent packing.
Cuba launched campaigns that made healthcare, education and housing
universal. Serious inroads were made against the poverty, racism and
sexual exploitation created by centuries of colonization and
dictatorship.
Pushed by U.S. aggression into nationalizing foreign holdings, banking
and other key industries, Cuban leaders were able to plan centrally and
control trade, improving life vastly.
But the new workers state suffered from the outset from a major
deformity. The people were never the makers of crucial decisions: which
goods would be produced and how; what social benefits would be provided;
whether to aid sister and brother rebels in other lands. Instead these
decisions were made by a bureaucracy politically similar to Stalin's
regime in the USSR, although it never installed the bloody police state
that Stalin did.
The Cuban Communist Party (CCP) adopted the treacherous and deceitful
Stalinist policy of building "socialism in one country." Using this as
justification, the CCP repeatedly betrayed proletarian struggles
throughout Latin America, abandoning them to Cuba's perceived
self-interest in negotiating ddétente with world imperialism.
Socialism, however, can only exist as an international system, with
sharing and coordination of global goods and resources. As long as
capitalism controls most of the world market, the fate of any workers
state remains precarious. Capitalism's recapture of the Soviet bloc and
China is a harsh proof of this.
Peril from without and within.When
the USSR collapsed, Cuba lost its key trade partner, one that bought
sugar and other exports and sold industrial technology and other vital
imports on favorable terms. Cuba's economy fell into desperate straits.
Ever the humanitarian, the U.S. escalatedits
embargo, trying to starve out the revolution.
In response, the CCP initiated measures to attract the desperately
needed hard currency it could use on the capitalist world market. The
reforms brought foreign capital to Cuba. With it came the danger of
reversion to the dominance of the profit system, with its inevitable
exploitation and oppression.
As foreign business expanded in Cuba, so did inequality, as some groups
of people gained access to more income, benefits and outright bribes.
Black Cubans experienced greater racism, particularly in the
fast-growing tourism industry. Prostitution reappeared.
No one could live on the average state salary of $20 a month, so the
black market flourished, as did corruption. Everyone is frustrated by
the lack of consumer goods. Many young people are becoming alienated
from the revolution their grandparents made.
Events of the past year are alarming. President Raúl Castro has opened
the door to even more intense inequality by removing salary caps and
instituting production incentives, saying that workers in favored
positions should “make as much as they can.” Untilled state land is
being turned over to private agriculture.
On the world scene, Cuba has thrown its lot in with popular-front
governments in Latin America. These are governments like Venezuela's,
whose leaders talk a good pro-worker line, and come to power with the
support of workers and the poor, but offer no real challenge to
capitalism. These countries are trying to improve their position in the
world economy through a trade bloc called the Bolivarian Alliance for
the Peoples of Our America (ALBA).
For an isolated workers state, trade alliances with capitalist countries
are unavoidable. The harm done by Cuban officials is in painting these
deals as part of the road to socialism rather than a hazardous but
necessary detour.
Keep the revolution alive!Cuba's
great potential saving grace is that the voice of the people, while
muffled, was never silenced. Vibrant discussions are taking place in the
streets and on the Internet.
An array of militant voices in Cuba are calling for the very steps that
would breathe new life into the revolution: decision-making power in the
hands of workers' and peasants' councils; tightened state control of
foreign trade and the reversal of privatizations; freedom of speech,
association, travel and Internet access for workers; autonomy for unions
and mass organizations; and foreign policy guided by revolutionary
internationalism.
One example is a program circulated by former diplomat Pedro Campos and
co-thinkers that calls for workers' democracy and demands that the CCP
allow internal factions. The program was circulated on the
Spanish-languagewww.kaosenlared.netand
widely discussed during the past year. Proponents hoped to present it at
the CCP's upcoming sixth congress, making it "the trigger for a national
democratization."
But Raúl Castro seems determined to tighten bureaucratic control rather
than let the people be heard. Some revolutionary critics, like
kaosenlared contributor Miguel Arencibia Daupés, have been harassed and
lost their state jobs. And, on July 31, Raúl announced the postponement
of the party congress. Days later came the news that more state
companies would be put under the management of the army, which Raúl has
headed for decades and which plays a major role in the joint enterprises
that brought foreign capitalists into Cuba.
Meanwhile, Barack Obama announced in August an end to limits on travel
and money sent to families in Cuba by U.S. relatives. But his real
interest is in opening a door to Cuba for U.S. corporations.
Sympathetic working people across the world should look for ways to
support the advocates of socialist workers' democracy within Cuba. At
the same time, the fight to keep the U.S. boot off Cuba's neck must grow
stronger. This means demanding an end to the embargo and to all U.S.
interference - military threats, undercover CIA-type action, and
economic coercion.
Just as only workers' democracy can force the necessary course change on
the island, Cuba cannot survive alone forever. The final chapter of this
epic struggle must be the building of a revolutionary U.S. movement
powerful enough to stop U.S. aggression around the globe and win an
egalitarian society in the heartland of imperialism. Start it up!
Susan Williams, a cofounder of Doctors Council Local 10MD, SEIU, can
be contacted at
drsusan@nyct.net.
LA CIA, EL MONSTRUO DE LAS MIL CARAS
Dr. Néstor García Iturbe
22 de octubre del 2009.
Como parte de la Operación que la CIA ha diseñado para tratar de
destruir la revolución cubana, aparece ahora un llamado Partido
Socialista por la Libertad (“Freedom Socialist Party”) que el 19 de
octubre de este año publicó un artículo titulado “El destino de Cuba se
balancea en el filo de la navaja” escrito por una persona que dice
llamarse Susan Williams.
La Operación a que hacemos referencia está compuesta por varias Acciones
Encubiertas que se complementan una con la otra y cuyo fin principal es
revertir el proceso revolucionario cubano para lograr la llamada
“transición” e instaurar en Cuba un gobierno que obedezca al pie de la
letra las instrucciones de Estados Unidos. De la Operación hablaremos
próximamente, pues ahora quisiera ocuparme en concreto de esta Acción.
Este tipo de Acción es de las que la CIA califica como “diversionista”.
El contenido del mensaje trata de aparentar ser revolucionario y
preocupado por el destino de Cuba. Su objetivo es agrupar bajo la
dirección de sus agentes un grupo de personas, que sin estar en contra
de la revolución, manifiesten cierta inconformidad con algunas de las
acciones que el gobierno revolucionario lleve a cabo o de las
dificultades que afrontamos, en su mayoría provocadas por el férreo
bloqueo a que nos tiene sometidos Estados Unidos.
Es tratar de capitalizar a su favor la crítica objetiva y necesaria que
promueve la propia revolución para mejorar el proceso y a la que nos
convocan periódicamente el Partido Comunista de Cuba, las organizaciones
de masa y el aparato estatal en su conjunto.
La idea es crear una fracción que se convierta en el “vocero” de
aquellos que quieren plantear distintos problemas y que en vez de
utilizar para eso las vías establecidas, lo hagan agrupándose en esta
nueva institución.
Al inicio del citado artículo se plantea que
“el
pueblo cubano ha defendido valientemente su meta de crear el socialismo
a pesar de presiones económicas, políticas y militares”.
Un buen comienzo para que los lectores revolucionarios bajen la guardia
y el mensaje pueda ser aceptado en su conjunto. Comenzar con una verdad
objetiva debe ayudar a la asimilación de las mentiras que le sigan.
El segundo mensaje también va dirigido a fortalecer la recepción
positiva del lector revolucionario sobre lo que posteriormente se
plantea. El contenido de este aparece en el segundo párrafo, cuando dice
“¿cuánto tiempo más podrá la isla evitar el regreso al capitalismo?
Ya en el tercer párrafo del mensaje se deja ver claro el propósito
de este artículo, cuando se argumenta que existen pasos para proteger
los logros de la revolución cubana, contra la amenaza de la restauración
del capitalismo en Cuba. Esta involución, según el artículo es
consecuencia de que “la burocracia dirigida por Raúl Castro está
acelerando el paso en la dirección
equivocada.”
Aquí comienzan los ataques a la revolución cubana y
en especial contra la figura de nuestro presidente, el compañero Raúl.
Este mensaje es el mismo que han repetido los órganos de inteligencia de
Estados Unidos cuando han tratado de instaurar lo que ellos califican la
“transición”. Es en esencia lo mismo que se plantea en el llamado “Plan
Bush para la libertad de Cuba”, estructurado en momentos en que era el
compañero Fidel nuestro presidente. Todo el que luche por nuestra
soberanía e independencia, todo el que defienda los derechos del pueblo
cubano, según estos señores se encuentran “en
la dirección equivocada.”
En los
párrafos siguientes el artículo retoma el estilo de alabanza sobre todo
lo que ha realizado la revolución en estos años, nuevamente trata de
ganar la atención del lector después de haber dejado sembrada la
“semilla” contra nuestro gobierno. Se retoma el problema de culpar de
nuestros males a lo que ellos llaman “la burocracia” cuando se plantea
que el pueblo no ha sido quien ha tomado las decisiones principales sino
“una burocracia políticamente similar al régimen de
Stalin en la URSS, aunque nunca creó el sangriento estado policíaco como
Stalin lo hizo.”
Este nuevo ataque a “la burocracia” trata de desconocer la participación
de nuestro pueblo en las más importantes decisiones que se han tomado en
el país. Solapadamente se cuestiona nuestro sistema electoral, donde se
elijen a los representantes del pueblo que son los que en la Asamblea
Nacional de Poder Popular participan en la discusión de leyes y
políticas que rigen los destinos de nuestra nación. La referencia al
régimen de Stalin en la antigua URSS es totalmente desafortunada y
traída a un contexto que no corresponde, precisamente nuestro pueblo
puede dar constancia de eso.
También al Partido Comunista de Cuba se le acusa de traicionero y de
stalinista en el mencionado artículo. Para ello el autor del artículo se
apoya en la vieja teoría trotskista de la imposibilidad de realizar la
revolución en un solo país.
Al hacer referencia a esta etapa de la revolución, para nada analizan el
momento en que Cuba se quedó casi totalmente aislada al desaparecer el
campo socialista y que fue necesario tomar cuanta medida se pudo para
garantizar la subsistencia del estado revolucionario. Se trata de
ocultar el desarrollo dialectico que ha tenido la lucha revolucionaria
en América Latina y el estado en que la misma se encuentra en nuestros
días. No se quiere reconocer el papel de Cuba en el enfrentamiento al
enemigo principal y en el fortalecimiento, con su ayuda solidaria, a los
gobiernos latinoamericanos y de otras regiones del mundo que ahora
luchan por su total independencia y que mantienen una posición de
enfrentamiento o al menos soberana ante Estados Unidos.
Cuando el artículo hace referencia a la situación política mundial y en
especial de América Latina, se critica a Chávez y a otros países que se
encuentran defendiendo los intereses de sus pueblos, incluyendo en esto
la Alianza Bolivariana para los Pueblos de Nuestra América (ALBA). Estas
manifestaciones son similares a las que diariamente realizan los
personeros de la administración Obama en su lucha por cerrarles el paso
a los gobiernos independientes de América Latina. Es lo mismo que dice
la “oposición” organizada y financiada por la NED y la USAID, encargadas
de repartir el dinero que la CIA les entrega.
En uno de los párrafos finales el autor plantea que deben permitirse
fracciones dentro del Partido Comunista de Cuba, atribuyendo esta idea a
dos de sus seguidores. Evidentemente la unidad de nuestro Partido es
considerada por los enemigos de la revolución como una de sus
principales fortalezas, de ahí que por todos los medios tratan de
introducir el fraccionalismo. Esto nos alerta ante la necesidad de
fortalecer los métodos de trabajo del partido, continuar garantizando la
democracia interna, la unidad de acción y el centralismo democrático.
El artículo termina haciendo un llamado al apoyo a los “defensores de
la democracia obrera socialista dentro de Cuba” y la “edificación
de un poderoso movimiento revolucionario en Estados Unidos para
construir una sociedad igualitaria en el corazón del imperialismo.”
La nota final del artículo es un reflejo de lo que plantea la CIA en
varias de sus campañas, tratando de hacer ver una situación inexistente
de represión y falta de oportunidades en Cuba para los obreros, los
campesinos, los negros y las mujeres. Todo esto pudiera creerlo alguien
que no conozca Cuba, pero es sin duda algo que los enemigos tratan de
crear con el propósito de dividir a nuestro pueblo. La ratificación del
objetivo antes mencionado la tenemos en las distintas acciones que
desarrollan los grupúsculos autodenominados “disidentes”, las cuales
coinciden perfectamente con lo planteado en el artículo que estamos
analizando.
La CIA es el monstruo de las mil caras, aparece en lugares disímiles,
con un ropaje distinto, tratando de introducir sus agentes e ideas y en
algunos casos, como este, llega inclusive a disfrazarse de
revolucionaria para poder lograr el apoyo de los incautos y unirlos con
los traidores de la patria.
Es fácil de descubrir. Cuando manifiesta sus objetivos, cuando plantea
oposición a verdaderos revolucionarios, cuando hace referencia a las
gastadas campañas con que ha estado trabajando en los últimos años,