07/23/13 - Cuba-L Analysis (Albuquerque) -
THE TRUE DISSIDENCE
By Domingo Amuchastegui
 
A CubaNews translation.
Edited by Walter Lippmann.

The spectacular sprint of Yoani Sanchez for her quasi-world tour, followed by the others (Payá’s daughter, Berta Soler, Elizardo Sánchez, "Coco" Fariñas, Eliécer Ávila and the rest) is reaching its end. Simultaneously , the media coverage has dimmed out –as was anticipated early by a work published in Madrid by El Pais- caused by both the repetitive discourse and the loss of media interest. Their return is taking place without a bang until a fabricated incident awakes media curiosity again.

The funny thing is that these media powers, some of them academic “experts” on the Cuba subject and Miami’s little world, never -or almost never- seem to be aware of the existence of another stronger dissidence - more effective, influential and decisive. This other dissidence -that does not consult the U.S. Embassy or any other embassy, nor receives payment from USAID or belligerent factors in Miami- was in the past, is today and will be tomorrow the true dissidence.

The others –the travelers- are a different thing; they are those who, for 25 years, have been trying to be someone and never made it; they have never been dissidents in the real meaning of the word, but have tried to be to this day just an opposition poorly paid (because the bulk of the money seems to stay and dissolve in Miami and Washington) with no mass mobilization power.

At most –as has been demonstrated more than once during the visits of the travelers- they formulate renewed requests for material and monetary aid, and claim –some with a sugar coated language, others in more explicit and naked terms- that the U.S. must tighten the rope, asphyxiate the Havana regime and strengthen all actions until the collapse that they - today’s travelers- are not able to materialize. There are some –like Oscar Elias Biscet- who recommends that he U.S. repeat in Cuba the war strategy used in Bosnia in the 90’s. This is a similar outlook to that of the defeated Batistianos and other sectors who went into exile in 1959-1961, all of them waiting with blind faith for Washington and the marines to grant them a victorious return.

Yesterday, today and always, the media powers, the “experts” and Miami’s little world have offered an extremely stereotyped view of the Cuban political process. They reduce everything to the monopoly of the “official line”, to what Fidel says or what Granma publishes; they insist on a redundant black and white presentation without shades or nuances. This has not contributed one bit to distinguish different or contrasting positions within the revolutionary ranks, nor to understand the inner dynamics of the debate or confrontation, neither the trends nor the policy changes inside Cuba.

There was and there is dissidence within the revolutionary ranks, and it has a thousand different expressions. Since the times of insurrectional struggle to the present situation in Cuba, this has been a permanent and recurrent phenomenon. To reduce its understanding to the simplification of totalitarianism or a monolithic bloc where nobody expresses anything different, nullifies all possibilities of properly understanding what happened, happens and will happen in Cuba.

The whole insurrectional process was full of debate and dissidence, from la Sierra to the Llano [the revolutionary movement in the cities]; the struggle between a Directorio Nacional and Fidel Castro, the April [1958] strike, the way to fight, the differences and confrontations between M-26 and 13-DR, the PSP [Partido Socialista Popular –Communist Party], Autenticos, Ortodoxia, Triple A, Resistencia Civica. In late 1958, one thing was the Comandancia de la Columna 1 where many trends and personalities coexisted, and a different thing was the Marxist indoctrination in Tumbasiete.

And even more so in 1959, when the clash against trends opposed to the Revolution, U.S. policy, the differences and quarrels within the different revolutionary organizations were everyday matters. To consider the dissidences of those days is essential to understand the final results that outlined the 60’s.

The alarm and criticism on the over dimensioned role of the PSP; wasn’t this an expression of dissidence? And wasn’t another expression the denunciation of sectarianism (read: a virtual coup d’état attempted by Anibal Escalante, his followers and the Soviet ambassador Kudriatzev- a story yet to be told)? And, to a lesser extent, wasn’t the micro-fraction yet another?

Similarly, weren’t the continuous confrontations in the area of culture and economic policy that extended without interruptions until the 70’s expressions of dissidence? How many persons received with reservations and alarm the replacement of cooperatives with state farms? Many did and said so. Was there unanimity in unleashing the so-called “Revolutionary Offensive” or to support the Soviets in their invasion of Czechoslovakia? Certainly there wasn’t and many expressed this at different levels.

The idea that nationalizing ice cream carts or bodegas had nothing to do with the concepts of socialism was a very popular belief among many. This was repeatedly said, as well as the reasoning that claimed: “Stop blaming the blockade”, against the official line of blaming the blockade for the mistakes and extremisms of “official policies”.

And wasn’t it pure dissidence to warn about the substantial modification of the class nature and the reasons for people to continue leaving the country as early as 1970, and the need to rectify policies in that sense?

It is precisely because there is no monolithic view or totalitarianism that many party members did not understand or agreed with the “dialogue with the [Cuban] community abroad” at the end of the 70’s, and many wrote to Fidel Castro expressing their reservations and disagreements.

And what about the “struggle against ideological divisionism”, the “Quinquenio Gris” [gray five year period]” or “Decenio Negro” [black ten year period], the shutting down of the Department of Philosophy and the magazine Pensamiento Critico and the repetition -20 years later- with “CEA Case”? What were those but evidence of debates, discrepancies, disagreements, or dissidence against erratic official policies within a seemingly bloc uniformity? How many were accused of being pro-perestroika for sympathizing with the process of perestroika in the former Soviet Union? They were the forever dissidents, “the difficult”, “the contrary”, “the troublemakers”, “the freethinkers”; those who “did not trust the line of the Party”.

Were they not dissidents those who were pushing for the ideas and models of Perfecionamiento Empresarial [Managerial Improvements] to shape fully and timely the economic action of the country in the 80’s? They were the same people who even after the 5^th Congress (1997) and the adoption of this policy as the “official line” had to keep pushing for ten more years.

And how many warned in time about the useless and counterproductive nature of a “scientific atheism”? Weren’t they dissidents of the official line? How many persons of great merit were denied membership in the Party? And all this to end up abandoning such policy ten years later and putting in place one completely the opposite.

Those who raised their voices against such policies; those who wrote or debated behind closed doors or publicly; those who, when the call for the 4th Congress of the PCC [Cuban Communist Party], were in favor of radical rectifications and changes that only now seem to be appearing on the horizons of change and redesign taking place in Cuba: those were true dissidents. It would be enough evidence to take a look at the million Party meeting minutes that record those episodes.

And the debates that took place in 2007; were they not the widest and most democratic ever seen? They all conveyed a devastating criticism of the past official policies of every kind; they all provided claims and ideas that today are being implemented.

All those who raised their voices in assemblies, meetings, on the Internet, in exchanges of letters or e- mails, in academic or intellectual milieus, or in informal gatherings; all those were –and are- the other dissidents; the other dissidence that did not try to destroy, but to do things better; the one that warned and criticized, the one that sought –and seek- a better socialism, fresher, open to all opinions, diverse, democratic, without intimidations or secrecy, respectful; a socialism that would work and generate sustainable individual and collective progress.

Each and every one of these paragraphs –from 1958 to the present- could be illustrated with many anecdotes and the names of men and women who were an integral part of the revolutionary process, including its leadership. Those who were participants know this is so; the others deny it. I hope history will acknowledge them.  
 
In today’s crossroads, the paid opponents -with the extinct Proyecto Varela or the leaflets for sale of Yoani Sanchez, or the verbal bullying of Berta Soler and others- are not seen as representing the real life and tendencies that open the future in Cuba. Today’s true dissidence – facing the experience of the past, the present and the future- is represented by the many who shaped a great number of the ideas collected in the Call for the 6th Congress of the Party. The implementation of those ideas –together with many other measures in preparation- indicate a successful outcome for the continuity of the Cuban experience.

Each episode of those wrongly called dissidents has been followed –for more than 25 years now- by a media bubble with a certain enthusiasm in Miami, and also by short-lived or brief coverage. The inventory multiplies, grows and dissolves in oblivion or inefficacy; both in Cuba with the cases of Armando Valladares, Elizardo Sánchez, Rafael del Pino, Vladimiro Roca, Ricardo Bofill, Raúl Rivero, Héctor Palacios, Héctor Maseda, Jorge Luis García Pérez (Antúnez), Marta Beatriz Roque, Manuel Cuesta Morúa, Oscar Elías Biscet, Osvaldo Payá, hasta la UNPACU, Ailer González, José Daniel Ferrer, Ariel Sigler, Guillermo "Coco" Fariñas, Las Damas de Blanco, Yoani Sánchez and others as well as in Miami with the countless organizations of the “historical exiles”. Will their opposition take them to any effective or transcendental victory? The past and present events do not seem to indicate this will be so.

If one dissident is now doing something effective to reform, change, redesign and improve the Cuban experience, it is Raul Castro with his team and the younger generations that today already occupy most of the power position in Cuba. The others, the travelers, they are just a media show.