[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 81 (Tuesday, May 16, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1051]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                         END THE CUBAN EMBARGO

                                 ______


                        HON. JOHN JOSEPH MOAKLEY

                            of massachusetts

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, May 16, 1995
  Mr. MOAKLEY. Mr. Speaker, I recently wrote to President Clinton 
urging him to immediately begin negotiations with the Government of 
Cuba aimed at lifting the economic embargo and normalizing relations.
  For over three decades, we have tried to force Fidel Castro from 
power by maintaining a tight economic embargo on Cuba. But, that 
embargo has failed to hasten Mr. Castro's departure and has failed to 
fuel the type of internal pressures to advance the democratic reforms 
that so many of us want to see.
  Instead, the embargo has encouraged and strengthened the sentiments 
of nationalism in Cuba, provoked an increase in immigration to the 
United States--and it has provided Mr. Castro with a perfect excuse to 
justify the failures of his system.
  It is my hope that the Clinton administration will recognize the 
obvious failures of our current policy and change course.
  I would like to call my colleagues' attention to a recent article 
written for the Boston Globe by Elizabeth Shannon entitled, ``United 
States Should End Its Embargo Against Cuba.'' Ms. Shannon, who is a 
writer and administrator at Boston University, makes a compelling case 
for changing our policy.
                  [From the Boston Globe, May 4, 1995]

           United States Should End Its Embargo Against Cuba

                         (By Elizabeth Shannon)

       President Clinton's reversal of our Cuban refugee situation 
     may be the administration's first step toward changing a 
     policy which has been ill-advised and self-defeating 
     throughout this century. To insist on continuing and 
     expanding the harsh and illogical embargo against Cuba when 
     an accord favorable to both countries could be reached is 
     inconsistent with American self-interest. What good is it to 
     have 11 million people near starvation or to create political 
     chaos on a small island just 90 miles off our shores?
       Whatever Fidel Castro is--guerrilla fighter, oppressive 
     dictator, unrelenting windbag, nouveau capitalist--he is well 
     aware of the failure of the Revolution and is groping for a 
     way out, peering through the doors of private enterprise that 
     are opening up to him and liking what he sees.
       Through his own mismanagement and the loss of the $5 
     million annual subsidy from the Soviet Union, the 
     infrastructure of Cuba is in shambles. The Spanish colonial 
     mansions in Havana's suburbs are in bleak disrepair. Black 
     smoke from oil wells pollutes the air. The few cars one sees 
     are vintage American models, making the streets of Havana 
     look like a set for a Bogart film. Engines rust on unused 
     rail tracks, and buses have been replaced by ancient flatbed 
     trucks with benches nailed to the floor to serve as public 
     transportation.
       Children beg on the streets of Havana. The only miracle 
     left, hard to fathom, is the good nature and indomitable 
     spirit of the Cuban people and their faith, slightly frayed, 
     in ``El Comandante.''
       Cuba is trying to deal with its economic crisis by 
     participating in joint private enterprise projects, mainly 
     with Canada, Mexico and Europe. It is also pouring money into 
     tourism, which is growing at the rate of 20 percent annually.
       There is still no free press, radio or television and one 
     wonders about the literacy level when there are so few books 
     to read. There are no young, would-be Fidels in the 
     university; dissenters who still fear a knock on the door at 
     night.
       Nevertheless, there is an easing of some of the harsh, 
     repressive social policies of the past two decades. The 
     availability of educational opportunities and day care 
     centers have made it possible for women to achieve goals not 
     available to them in the pre-Castro days. Churches are open 
     again after more than two decades. The repulsive policy of 
     informing--on one's neighbors, friends, family--is becoming 
     discredited.
       The farmers' markets that are now allowed in the cities 
     have eased the harsh deprivation of food supplies. Pork and 
     fowl, beans, rice and vegetables are plentiful. The markets 
     are crammed with shoppers, trading in dollars, the favored 
     currency, instead of Cuban pesos.
       But the Cuban people, adoring as many are toward their 
     ``Maximum Leader,'' are restive and eager for a better life.
       A respected journalist who has lived in Cuba through the 
     Revolution said to me recently: ``Castro will change. He is, 
     above all, a pragmatist and is keenly interested in how 
     history will judge him. Of course, he must save face. Let him 
     devise the words he will use to roll with the change. 
     Democracy? People here aren't too interested in democracy. 
     They are most interested in getting food on the table without 
     having to stand in line for hours, in having things work, in 
     good gasoline, new cars, a transportation system, electricity 
     that doesn't work on whim.''
       Cubans want to talk business. And, ironically, it may be 
     American businessmen rather than politicians and diplomats 
     who change our Cuban policy. They are flocking to the island.
       It would seem that these moves toward capitalism would make 
     America happy and might even make Sen. Jesse Helms smile. But 
     our reaction has been to tighten the embargo and punish those 
     countries--our allies and friends--who do trade with Cuba, 
     creating more ill-will.
       What guides our current policy toward Cuba? It is a 
     combination of inertia and our indefatigible desire to punish 
     Castro, to bring him down, that feeds the inflammatory 
     rhetoric of Helms and the implacable hatred toward Castro of 
     members of the exile community, who are now threatening to 
     shut down businesses in Miami in protest of Clinton's new 
     policy. It does nothing to create a viable climate in which 
     to bolster Cuba's waning economy into a stable, thriving and 
     eventually capitalistic society.
       If there is one lesson to be learned from the story of 
     Vietnam, so sorely reopened by Robert McNamara's memoirs, it 
     is to recognize the fatal miscalculation of foreign policy-
     makers who, so sure of their direction, don't read the road 
     signs. Policies conceived in honest hope grow old and out-
     dated and, eventually, fatal. The theory that to make 
     democracy work in Cuba we must ``defeat Castro'' and punish 
     the Cuban people is flawed.
       A European diplomat said to me in Havana: ``Castro could 
     probably defend Cuba against 100,000 American Marines. There 
     is no way he could defend it against 100,000 American 
     tourists!'' This moment in Cuba's history is an opportunity 
     for President Clinton to begin the process of negotiation. 
     Perhaps Jimmy Carter could make a stopover in Havana when he 
     is in the area.
     

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