UNVEILING WESTERN MEDIA PROPAGANDA
The 11th of July marked the first day of the likely-astroturfed protests in Cuba. The people were in desperate need of help as COVID-19 cases soared and vaccination rollouts were delayed and slowed. The standard of living has plummeted significantly since the emergence of the pandemic, as Cuba’s tourism accounts for 13% of its GDP. The consequences of the pandemic tied in with the 60-year embargo, which is a tool that works to isolate and create economic difficulties for the governing body by design, has only exacerbated the Cuban government’s problems. This situation has been twisted by the US corporate media as something of a large-scale anti-government protest, with images and videos being misused to dish out as much propaganda and misinformation as they can.
In one instance, a sign held up by a man in a video is blurred out by Fox News, claiming it is an anti-government protest despite the sign reading “the streets belong to the revolutionaries”, a popular slogan in support of the Cuban government.
Calling out this blasphemy is crucial as ill-informed readers can quickly assume that these pictures are in support of the anti-government demonstrations, which, in turn, may draw in more support for an astroturfed protest and destabilize the country as it justifies Biden’s push towards more sanctions.
The media has manipulated the demonstrations to appear as an anti-communist movement. While some members of the protest may dislike the ideology, it is entirely possible that the emergence of the protest is sponsored by the US or some other foreign power as a color revolution. ‘Astroturfing’ is the practice of masking the sponsors of a message or organization to make it appear as though it originates from and is supported by grassroots participants; a color revolution has more or less the same meaning.
While protests are normal because they allow the population to show the government what matters to them, such as better handling of COVID-19 or fixing food shortages, the US corporate media has spun this around as mass anti-government protests. These grievances are undoubtedly real, but that’s the thing about color revolutions: they ultimately exploit true grievances to make the astroturfing more legitimate.
Despite experiencing the same pains as anti-government protesters, many more revolutionary Cubans recognized the event as another attempt by the US to destabilize the country, and took to the streets in overwhelmingly large numbers to counter what they perceived as puppets of the US’s imperialist cause. You know the US is devious when their news outlets feel the need to appropriate footage of the thousands more counter-protesters and revolutionaries to back up their claim that there exist “thousands of anti-government protesters” and lie about it. A Twitter thread by user @morganastra details the real situation in Cuba back in July.
WHY HAS THE US NOT ENDED THE EMBARGO?
For approximately 60 years, Cuba has been shackled by an embargo universally condemned with the exception of the USA and Israel, who have consistently voted against the end of the embargo in the annual UN resolution upheld since 1992. Unfortunately, the UN doesn’t have the authority and power to enforce its votes, and the only way the embargo can be lifted is via the US Congress—an unlikely outcome and a despairing truth for the Cubans living in Cuba.
The sole reason the US has maintained such a long and despised embargo is to see the collapse of the communist-state whilst the Western media underplays its effects and severity. “The only foreseeable means of alienating internal support is through disenchantment and disaffection based on economic dissatisfaction and hardship,” quotes a US State Department in reference to communism in Cuba. The USA directly admits there is no other way to combat support in Cuba, and thus comes to the conclusion of bringing about hardship and following a policy that “makes the greatest inroads in denying money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation, and the overthrow of the government”.
This is why the embargo is sustained: Its ultimate aim is regime change, to replace the communist government with the US puppeteered government as we saw in Afghanistan.
Not only does the embargo disrespect the sovereignty of Cuba, but it doesn’t help the Cubans at all, and was simply created to cripple and destabilize a government that challenges the status quo. Due to the overwhelming support for communism in Cuba, the CIA’s efforts were to no avail; the US instead chose to starve the Cubans until they eventually break and begin blaming the government for its calamities.
So that’s the problem: Cuba and its people do not want to submit to the US empire and want to remain communist, but the USA desperately wants it to return to a “democracy”. Unfortunately, the dirty truth is that the US isn’t after democracy. What they really want is a return to a free-market capitalist society that they can exploit.
There is no denying that this is their ultimate goal when we consider the history between the two countries. The US previously backed Batista, a dictator who ruled Cuba in a free-market capitalist society for the US to exploit. On the US domination of the Cuban economy, JFK said: “At the beginning of 1959, United States companies owned about 40 percent of the Cuban sugar lands—almost all the cattle ranches—90 percent of the mines and mineral concessions—80 percent of the utilities—practically all the oil industry—and supplied two-thirds of Cuba’s imports”.
Economically, communism often nationalizes industries, pushing sectors like oil into being state-controlled and prying them out of reach from private hands. So, when Fidel Castro came to power, the country nationalized many industries, taking back many factories and farms from US capitalists and even redistributing their vacation homes to the Cuban people. It’s no surprise that the US was extremely furious as their assets had been ‘stolen’ and a communist revolution had just taken stronghold less than 230 miles from Florida.
WHAT DOES THE EMBARGO ENTAIL?
Although US officials claim that the embargo doesn’t affect food and medicine, it does. The Helms-Burton Act adds to the crippling sanctions by disincentivizing non-US-companies from trading with Cuba as the act permits sanctions to be applied onto the company assets in the US or even barring the company leadership from entering the US. The act effectively and annoyingly corners these companies into an ultimatum—they can only choose one market to partake in, and because the USA is a much larger market, it would be foolish of any company seeking profits to side with Cuba over the USA.
On top of all that, the 180-day rule also means that non-US ships that have traded with Cuba cannot enter and unload on US ports for 180 days (or half of the year), creating a complicated logistical issue for the trade ships.
With the 180-day rule and Helms-Burton act taken into account, we can further explore the dire situation. One of the grievances the protesters were chanting for was the fear of slow vaccine rollout and the rising COVID-19 cases in Cuba as the nation struggles in the race to fully vaccinate its population.
The US is depriving Cuba of the syringes it needs to manufacture for its mass vaccination campaign via sanctions and embargoes. Most of the world’s syringes are manufactured by three US companies and the five others have ties to the US; under the Helms-Burton Act, those five companies would face sanctions if they trade with Cuba—not very wise for the profit motive of these companies.
On top of those added laws, the sanctions prevent Cubans living in the US from sending remittances to their families back in Cuba. Remittances are a common cash flow seen across all parts of the world and play a crucial part in locally developing countries that receive remittances, yet the US sanctions strictly prohibit this. Why?
The US claims it is empathetic toward Cubans but actions speak louder than words, and all they’ve ever done is shown indifference. If they allowed remittances and maintained all the other sanctions, it would significantly increase the standard of living. This flow of money is so common that an example of it would be the tireless work foreign maids do when they clean homes and perform chores, pouring all their energy into earning a decent paycheck that they send a portion of to their families in their home country, hoping those they love could forge a better life. When a sanction is placed to prohibit someone from supporting their family through hard-earned money, there is no saying that the US government cares about Cubans with a straight face.
Then there are the “fact-checkers” that conclude “Although the embargo creates disincentives for other countries and companies to trade with Cuba, it does not compel them to cut economic ties with the island nation. Many countries, as well as some US companies, do business in Cuba”. This is a disingenuous conclusion as it underplays the actual effects of the embargo; while the embargo doesn’t force countries to cut economic ties, these non-US companies who engage internationally will always choose to trade with the US over Cuba simply because the market and potential profits are far larger.
“COMMUNISM IS A UNIVERSALLY FAILED SYSTEM”
The embargo is maintained to economically cripple the country, bring about hardships, and lower the standard of living; but despite all this, communism under Fidel Castro had made great progressive change. Cuba is renowned for its healthcare; everything is absolutely free, if not heavily subsidized by the government so no Cuban is burdened by the costs. Meanwhile, in the US, people are dying because they cannot afford their insulin medication, and people avoiding checkups because they’re worried about the bill. Cuba has exceptional statistics to take note of, including having 5.91 physicians per 1000 people while the US has a mere 2.30 per 1000. This highlights that Cuba produces many health care workers, who they also send abroad; since 1969, a total of 325,750 health care workers have participated in missions across 158 countries.
Other interesting statistics include the longevity of Cubans compared to their US neighbors. Cubans have an average life expectancy of 77.8 years, while the US has a bit more standing at 78.4 years. Despite the reduced resources, Cuba has managed to keep up with if not surpass their oppressor, but more importantly, guarantee every Cuban access to free, high-quality healthcare.
Furthermore, education is another sector that the communist-led island takes pride in. Cuba enjoys a 99% literacy rate that is on par with more-developed Western countries like the US. Comparing Cuba to its Latin American counterparts shows that it overwhelmingly outperforms them. A 1998 UNESCO study found that test achievements of the lower half of students in Cuba were significantly higher than the test achievement of the upper half of students in other Central and South American countries. Another successful aspect of Cuba’s education is the teacher-to-student ratio; with one teacher for every 12 students, it’s easy to understand why Cubans are so well-educated, as smaller class sizes allow for more personalized learning for students. The high-quality education system is fully subsidized by the government, meaning studying at all levels is free of charge for all Cubans. With this in mind, it’s no surprise that Cuba is undeniably scaling heights when it comes to education in its region.
The US constantly bickers over how communism doesn’t work and has failed. But at every step of the way throughout its history, the US has gone to great lengths to undermine communism. If they want to legitimately claim that communism fails, they must stop interfering and let it ‘naturally explode’. Fortunately, Cuba is a success story; it’s a story of how the island has, under massive sanctions, managed to provide its people with a world-renowned universal healthcare and education system. Despite being the richest country in the world, the US is struggling to match up to the living standards Cuba has; now whose system is the one failing here?
The US will maintain the embargo and cripple Cuba because it is terrified of what an embargo-free Cuba can accomplish. It is scared of what that would mean for its present-day system, and how that would affect its all-so-delicate status quo.
THE US DIVERSION OF RESPONSIBILITY
IGCSE history classes most likely fed you information about the Cuban missile crisis, the notary points being that JFK, to stop more missiles and military supplies being sent from the USSR to Cuba, had blockaded the country to prevent the Soviets from sending more arms against international law, in turn harming Cuba’s sovereignty.
JFK had deployed the term “quarantined” to avoid criticism and pushbacks from international diplomacy. However, if any country had given the US a taste of its own medicine, the US government would have a vastly different reaction. “Quarantine” is a euphemism for the dire situation that actually happened; that the USA had blockaded and bullied Cuba.
Just as every nation has the right to place missiles on their own soil (though I’m not advocating for that at all), Cuba was legally allowed to do the same; yet, when the Soviets saw an opportunity to return the favor of placing missiles aimed at the US just as the US had done to Moscow, the US decided to take a defensive approach.
Double standards like these show how contradictory the US is. Another obvious instance that highlights how the US has long been praying for the collapse of the communist government in Cuba was the Bay of Pigs invasion, a failed invasion of Cuba by Cuban exiles covertly funded and supported by the CIA to topple the government and restore the interests of the USA. Alongside the fact that the CIA had tried to assassinate Fidel Castro numerous times, it is painfully obvious how badly the USA wanted to destabilize the country and pave the way for governmental failure.
PREYING UPON CUBA
The US, in its earlier years, had support to annex the island for itself; Thomas Jefferson thought Cuba would be “the most interesting addition which could ever be made to our system of States” and then said that the USA “ought, at the first possible opportunity, to take Cuba”. One of the founding fathers of the US, worshipped as a god in some senses, unequivocally supported the annexation of Cuba if it were ever possible. If that doesn’t tell you a thing or two about the US, I don’t know what will.
The hundreds of attempts on Castro’s life and the CIA-backed invasion of Cuba serve as evidence that the US will stop at nothing to bring Cuba to its knees. To this day, there are instances of those still in power in the US who openly discuss extreme military actions such as execution and airstrikes against Cuba. If the roles were reversed, it would be over for the communist island. Not even that, but if any country for that matter had publicly repeated the words of those politicians back to the US, they would face severe backlash. However, because Western media has painted Cuba as a brutal dictatorship that oppresses its people, it’s been normalized for American politicians to say the things they say and for the ill-informed to truly believe that military intervention in Cuba would save Cubans.
Fortunately, there exists no position in which the US can annex Cuba anymore. Nonetheless, bringing about free-market capitalism via regime change is the next best possible move in making the island nation submit to the imperial knee of the US. This is why the embargo is still in place as the first step for regime change in Cuba.
“SPREADING DEMOCRACY”
For the longest time, I have personally associated ‘democracy’ with the US. It just goes to show how successfully the US has portrayed itself as the face of democracy for several decades now. So, when they claim that the embargo is in place to bring about democracy, I can see how the ill-informed would believe that.
Despite crying when their own elections have been meddled in, the US has intervened in several other countries’ elections apart from Cuba. We’re talking about a country that doesn’t actually care about bringing ‘democracy’ to Cuba; the US does not seem to advocate for democracy unless it serves their agenda. A prime example is when the US backed the 1973 military coup of Chile, ousting the democratically-elected Marxist Salvador Allende in favor of what would become an almost 20-year military dictatorship under Pinochet.
Pinochet ruled Chile with an iron fist, a rule so infamous for picking up dissidents in helicopters and tossing them into the ocean, but not before gutting them to make sure they would drown. The US would back anything but a leftist government; do you see the irony in that? The US worships ‘democracy’ and wants others to have it, yet while Chile was a prosperous democracy, the US chose to back a military dictatorship. We need to erase the connection that the “US equals democracy”. I know there are others who think about the US in the way I used to, and I hope to at least sow doubt in that idea through this article.
CONCLUSION
Allow me to note once again that even though the events were likely the result of astroturfing, the grievances are real. Cubans are under a heavy embargo meant to cripple the country and turn the citizens against an ideology that, in reality, protects and cares about them. People are being oppressed and many are suffering due to the combined effects of the loss of tourism (which makes up 13% of their country’s GDP) and the embargo. The embargo needs to end now. If the US truly cares about Cubans, they would lift the embargo, especially seeing how the pandemic has exacerbated the impact on the Cuban economy.
Now, you and I both know that by putting things into perspective and looking at history, we can see that it’s highly unlikely the embargo will ever end. Cuba has long been the target of US imperialism, but ever since it became communist, the US has taken even more interest. The US needs to, for its own agenda, destabilize Cuba and bring communism down with it because the ideology has long posed a threat to the ‘democracy’ that the US champions. Tied in with the already-decreasing support for free-market capitalism and the increasing support for communism or socialism, Cuba becomes an even more interesting target and focus for US foreign policy, because if the US can topple the government discreetly they can claim communism as a failed and unpopular system all whilst the corporate propaganda machine pukes out the same thing. If Cuba could one day operate unshackled, free from the chains of its oppressor, it would achieve even more success than it already has. And for that, it will remain shackled indefinitely.
A thriving Cuba would be too harmful to the US and would put their current status quo at threat as Cuba, unlike other communist countries, is far too close to the US to be allowed to succeed or be looked over. That is why there have been so many attempts to destabilize the country since its revolution, and why the embargo will continue to oppress Cubans. Whilst there isn’t much we can do in support of Cubans apart from donating, reading up on their revolution—why it happened and what communism is—would help put things into better perspective and give more credibility to Cuba and its people.