Bush's Anti-Cuba Plans



· "There is nothing covered up that will not be uncovered, nothing
hidden that will not be made known." (Luke 12.2)

RICARDO ALARCON DE QUESADA-President of the National Assembly of
People's Power-

ON May 20, 2004, with all pomp and ceremony, George W. Bush announced
his Plan for the annexation of Cuba. The interminable monster document
- of more than 450 pages - provoked a volley of criticism from all
sides.

Above all, from the Cuban people, who are threatened with extermination
and with the liquidation of their nation. As the sinister Plan states
in plain language, Cuba would simply disappear, would cease to exist.
Let us quickly review what would happen here if what Bush has approved
was to be applied:

· The return to their former owners of all properties, including all
homes from which millions of families would be evicted, in less than
one year and under the supervision and control of the U.S. government
via the U.S. government Commission for the Return of Properties.

· All aspects of the economy would be completely privatized including
education and health services; all cooperatives would be dissolved and
the old latifundia restored; social security and assistance would be
eliminated, including all pensions and retirement plans, and a special
program of public works would be organized for senior citizens which
would employ them as long as their state of health allows it; the
guidelines of the crudest neoliberalism would be rigorously applied.
Another Yankee government apparatus, the U.S. Standing Committee for
Economic Reconstruction, would be in charge of all that.

· In order to carry out what is perceived as meeting the tenacious
and invincible resistance of the people ("It will not be easy," Bush
acknowledges in the abovementioned document), they would give maximum
priority to mass and generalized repression: of all Party members, all
members of social and mass organizations and "other government
sympathizers," according to the text, which warns (is there any need?)
that the list of the victims of repression will be a long one." The
U.S. government would also directly supervise this with a repressive
apparatus "organized and directed by the State Department."

· The leadership of this program would be in the hands of a
bureaucrat appointed by Bush with the pompous title of "Coordinator for
the transition and reconstruction of Cuba," a species of administrator
and governor general for the island, as was General Leonard Wood more
than one century ago. He would have the same function - including the
same title - as that carried out by Mr. Brenner in invaded and
destroyed Iraq. Only in the case of Cuba, the coordinator has already
been appointed, a Mr. Caleb Mc Carry, who has visited certain European
countries to receive shameful complicity. His anticipated appointment
was presented by Bush himself as evidence that his Plan against Cuba
and Cubans is a serious matter and not just words.

· The Plan Bush also included specific measures against Cuban
Americans, whose links with their families on the island were
drastically reduced. Their general licenses to visit them were
eliminated and the discriminatory limitation of only being able to do
so every three years if granted a special permit to do so was imposed
on them, and all of that within a cruel and arbitrary redefinition of
the concept of the family, from which uncles and aunts, nephews and
nieces, cousins and other relatives were excluded. In order to achieve
its goal, the U.S. government would intensify its actions to do away
with the Cuban Revolution by following three basic lines: a constantly
more rigorous economic blockade, an increase in funding and material
support for internal mercenary grouplets and an ever-growing campaign
of propaganda and disinformation.

Anyone knows that undertaking to defeat the government of another
country; change its political, economic and social regime; and subject
it to its domination is a scandalous outrage to international law only
conceivable in people with a fascist mentality.

The illegal and aggressive nature of the Plan Bush is so evident, such
its delirious lack of moderation, that it was overtly objected to even
by agencies and individuals opposed to the Cuban Revolution and
defenders of imperialist policies and interests. That was the case of
various members of the so-called Inter-American Dialogue - including
known enemies of Cuba - who sent out a public letter rejecting that
Plan because they see in it a call to warfare and violence. One
individual described it as "terrifying" and "the most explosive in
relations between the United States and Latin America for the last 50
years."

Bush obtained something that is the dream of any U.S. politician: to
unite the broadest front, from the left to the right. Only this time
they came together to criticize him and his devilish Plan.

But he did have something in his favor. The media itself, the famous
media that accompanied him in May 2004 and echoed his publicity show,
knew how to keep a hermetic, disciplined silence from that point up
until the end of that year and afterwards. Something that was "the most
explosive" thing in half a century, simply disappeared from the
attention of the "information networks." The subject simply ceased to
exist. And that was the situation for a year and a half. Up until
December 2005.

Suddenly, out of the blue, when everybody had forgotten about it, it
was announced from Washington that there was to be another report on
Cuba in May 2006.

Speculation abounded. Among the politicians and academics who
criticized the simplistic barbarities from the right, there were even
those who imagined the possibility of a rectification.

May 20, 2006 arrived. The media became edgy and asked questions. But
nothing happened that day or in the following days and months. Official
spokespersons responded with evasions to inquiries from journalists.
Until, once again, they forgot about the matter.

The third week of June arrived and strangely, stealthily, it appeared
on the State Department website datelined 06/20/2006. But it would
appear that nobody saw it. A week went by while spokespersons and
informers maintained a total silence. Until some of the Miami media and
certain news agencies "discovered" what they decided to baptize a
"draft." Curiously, the discovery was simultaneous. And not at any
moment, but precisely coinciding with the most prolonged U.S. holiday
in the United States, which goes on up until Tuesday, July 4. As if the
information was to be buried in the midst of firework displays,
patriotic rhetoric and special sales in commercial centers, which is
how people over there recall the anniversary of Independence.

The text that has now been published does not stray one millimeter from
the Plan Bush. On the contrary. It begins by noting its ratification,
greeting the supposed successes that its application has had and, on
that "solid base," announces "additional measures" to "accelerate" the
end of the Cuban Revolution.

Those measures are worthy of analysis and I propose to do that later.
But there is something that demands the most energetic and urgent
condemnation. Something totally unusual.

Before detailing the "additional measures," those that have been made
public, the Report states that there are others contained in an
appendix that is to remain secret for "reasons of national security"
and to ensure their "effective realization."

After having divulged everything that they have divulged - tens of
millions of dollars more for their mercenaries, new economic
restrictions and illegal actions against international trade and the
sovereignty of Cuba and other nations, additional punishments for
Cubans and for citizens of other countries - and having made public
more than two years ago their Plan that describes to the finest detail
their intention to re-colonize Cuba; after all that, what is there at
this height to conceal with maximum secrecy? What are they hiding for
reasons of "national security and effective realization?" More
terrorist attacks? New assassination attempts on Fidel? Military
aggression? In the case of Bush and his buddies anything is possible

.

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