Bush uses 9/11 to target socialist Cuba
By Gloria La Riva
From a talk at the Sept. 21-22 Workers World Party
conference.
Imperialism has employed every weapon in its arsenal to try
to destroy Cuba: invasion, biological warfare, sabotage,
assassinations, attempts to assassinate its leadership, 40
years of terrorism from Washington.
You may have read in the press that the U.S. government
claimed that Cuba is falsifying information and misleading the
U.S. in its "war on terrorism." That really means the U.S. may
use the post 9/11 situation to attack Cuba more directly.
Why would such a small country of 11 million people, which
would seem to be of no consequence to the richest, most
powerful country in the world, continue to be a target of the
U.S.? Because Cuba has a socialist government and, being 90
miles from the U.S., it is an example that the ruling class
hates more and more every day.
U.S. imperialism knows that while it has tremendous capacity
to bombard Cuba, the overwhelming majority of its people stand
with the revolution and are willing to fight and die to defend
it.
The imperialist media have been predicting Cuba's fall since
1959. But they especially thought that Cuba could not survive
the collapse of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. Cuba lost
87 percent of its trade and wasn't able to find alternatives
right away. Overnight, Cuba lost 80 percent of its imports.
Production fell by almost 35 percent.
It was very difficult. The Cuban people made a collective
effort in this struggle. It was done with the leadership of the
Cuban Communist Party, the revolutionary Marxist-Leninist party
that is the guiding force in Cuban society. Its membership is
eight percent of the population, but it has been the key
element in organizing the workers and the people as a whole to
confront the crisis in a disciplined and creative fashion.
The party, together with the mass organizations, worked to
introduce necessary economic measures--all designed to defend
the socialist system. One of the most important things in this
Special Period, as they call it, was that the leadership never
depicted it as anything other than a necessary economic retreat
in order for the revolution to survive.
U.S. tried to trigger Cuba's collapse
The U.S. didn't stand idly by. Congress passed the notorious
Torricelli law, which prohibited trade between Cuba and
U.S.-third country subsidiaries. As a result Cuba's trade
dropped from $900 million to $1.6 million the next year. Then
came the Helms-Burton law in March 1996, thanks to
then-President Bill Clinton.
Their aim was to trigger an economic collapse and strangle
the economy.
In Cuba, the people face the problems of a poor country, of
historical underdevelopment, of a great lack of resources, of
the terrible blockade and the need to defend themselves against
the U.S. constantly.
But every step of the way, they work collectively to see how
they can improve every aspect of society.
Not one school or hospital was closed during the Special
Period. There was no epidemic of homelessness. There was no
political crisis. And one of the most outstanding achievements
of Cuba's revolution, free education, has been greatly improved
in the last three years.
There has been a terrible crisis in the sugar industry. The
prices on the world market have dropped and 90,000 workers have
been downsized. But they will maintain their income and go to
school to get professional retraining and extensive general
education.
Free the Cuban 5!
Ramon Labanino, Rene Gonzalez, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando
Gonzalez and Gerardo Hernandez had infiltrated the Cuban
right-wing terrorist groups in Miami in order to defend Cuba
from attacks. All of these groups have been trained, armed and
allowed to operate from Florida by the CIA and other U.S.
police agencies.
You can imagine what it took to pretend that you're one of
them, while all the time you are engaged in the most dangerous
tasks, in order to inform Cuba of any impending attacks.
They were convicted last June; sentenced in December to U.S.
federal prison. Three of them have life sentences, one has 15
years and one has 19 years.
We are part of the National Committee to Free the Five. Our
party is very proud to have been part of helping to initiate
that struggle. Just as Cuba mobilized all its people to bring
Elian Gonzalez home, they're mobilizing all the people, over
and over, to bring these five heroes home, and we can do no
less.
We stand with the Cuban Five. Their appeals will be filed
early next year. In the meantime, we organize meetings,
publicize their case and write to them. It is a very difficult
struggle. We stand with them like we stand with Mumia Abu-Jamal
and Leo nard Peltier and all U.S. political prisoners.
I want to give a brief message of solidarity from Gerardo
Hernandez, who is in Lompoc prison, on behalf of all five
brothers:
"Dear brothers and sisters, comrades of Workers World Party,
we wish you a successful national conference and express our
eternal gratitude for your solidarity and support, which gives
us strength to continue our struggle for justice. Hasta la
victoria siempre."
Reprinted from the Oct. 10, 2002, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyrighted
under a Creative
Commons License.
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