Obama, Castro and the perfect storm. Why is this crisis different from previous ones?

Obama, Castro and the perfect storm. Why is this crisis different from
previous ones?
JUAN ANTONIO BLANCO | La Habana | 6 de Julio de 2016 - 08:35 CEST.

This time the "doomsayers" are not the Cubanologists, Cuban-American
radio stations in Miami, US officials, or dissidents on the Island. This
time the somber portents are emanating from the best-informed echelons
of Cuban officialdom, and are being validated by ministerial directives.
The powers that be are envisioning a dire crisis whose magnitude could
rival that of the early 90s, but under current circumstances this would
trigger protests that could shatter the cohesion of Cuba's power-holding
elite.

The prospect that the island is on course to sail into a "perfect storm"
is portended not only by the deputy director of the newspaper Granma,
but also by party leaders in key municipalities, like the Plaza de la
Revolución, where the offices of the Councils of State and Ministers,
the PCC's Central Committee, and the ministries of the Interior and the
Armed Forces are located. The message being sent is one of uncertainty
about the immediate future.

There could be (according to these well-informed sources) social
uprisings on such a scale that it would be impossible to control them
without the excessive use of violence, and at a calamitous national and
international political cost.

The Americans' logic after 17 December

Preventing this perfect storm – which could unleash an exodus greater
than that from Mariel, in 1980 – was what prompted Obama to commence
exploratory talks with Havana in 2013. For the US intelligence
community it was clear that if the trend of social and economic decline
in Cuba was compounded by the collapse of the Venezuelan economy, a new
Cuban crisis could coincide with the US election year and Obama's last
year in office.

With this scenario in mind, the idea announced by Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright almost three years after passage of the Helms-Burton
Act, on January 5, 1999, was resuscitated: the US would be willing to
establish economic relations with non-State sectors of the Cuban
economy. It is obvious that the legal interpretation made by the Clinton
Administration of scope of the sanctions levied by Helms-Burton did not
include the private sector.

Based on this precedent, the Obama Administration decided to facilitate
economic and financial transactions with the non-State sector of the
Cuban economy, which did not require Congressional authorization.

Their "experts" predicted that doing so would improve living conditions
on the island, due to the private sector's tremendous potential to
create wealth and jobs in the short term. Their logic was that, in a
context of greater internal stability, Raúl Castro would be less
inclined to violently suppress basic freedoms. The most optimistic even
envisaged the island cooperating to find a political situation to its
colony-like dependence on Venezuela. The aim of this new strategy was to
ensure stability on the Island, not to overturn the totalitarian regime
in place there.

The old logic was succeeded by that exhibited by some influential
experts in political marketing, abruptly transformed into upstart
specialists on Cuba.

The logic of the elite in power

But the logic of Cuba's ruling elite defies such rational patterns. The
Castros did not feel obliged to make any reciprocal commitments that
would compel them to consider changes in their national or international
politics.

Unilateral concessions whetted their appetites. They asked the US for
more in bilateral negotiations, and even believed that the US president
could lift the embargo on State enterprises under military control
(something they are still working on).

The crisis that began to knock at the Island's gates was not solely
caused by Venezuela's economic collapse, and much less by the embargo.
It is also – and above all – the result of Raúl Castro's irresponsible
and stubborn refusal to implement the kind of swift reform that would
allow the emerging non-State sector to immediately receive an injection
of capital, technology, know-how and access to external markets.

Instead, the only thing they have intensified and spread has been
repression and levels of violence – which is precisely what US officials
wanted to prevent to avert the possibility of provoking instability and
an emigration crisis. The false suppositions upon which the new policy
toward Havana were based have contributed, in fact, to greater
instability on the island. Exactly the opposite of their intent.

18 months after 17 December Raúl Castro is captaining the country,
"steady as she goes," on course for a perfect storm. US unilateralism
actually aggravated, inadvertently, his arrogance and intransigence.

Obama's excellent performance during his visit to the Island does not
erase the fact that the Achilles heel of America's policies toward Cuba
is its misunderstanding of the "logic" employed by Cuba's ruling elite,
and Havana's assumption that it can ignore the necessary links between
freedom, prosperity and human rights, and still achieve rapprochement
with Washington.

Why is this crisis different from previous ones?

Three pillars of the Cuban totalitarian system have been broken: its
inefficient State economy, its overexploited subsidies from Venezuela,
and its discredited Communist ideology. Repression is all it has left.
Dealing with social protests, however, does not necessarily mean beating
the opposition, which is now even more numerous and proactive than in
1994. Whatever happens is going to be filmed and distributed, within the
country and to the whole world, by two million smartphones, which did
not exist back in the days of the Maleconazo.

On the Island frustration, discontent and deteriorating living
conditions are only increasing. And with them, so is the number of
potential migrants, who, after Cuba's negotiations with Ecuador,
Nicaragua and Mexico, now only have the sea left as an option. The USA
would receive an influx of immigrants ten times greater than that which
left from Mariel, and in an election year. In its shortsightedness,
Havana seems to believe that this threat could be the instrument of
blackmail it needs to finally achieve a lifting of the embargo on the
State economy. The consequences of this stratagem could be catastrophic.

In his ineptitude, Raúl Castro may not appreciate the true dimensions of
the current situation. He has created a perfect storm, one bearing down
on both Cuba and the US.

Source: Obama, Castro and the perfect storm. Why is this crisis
different from previous ones? | Diario de Cuba -
http://www.diariodecuba.com/cuba/1467786931_23621.html