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U. S. - Cuban Relations In 1966, NACLA (the North American Congress on Latin America) was founded as an independent organization. It originated out of the United States students movement. The aim of it was to supply policymakers, journalists, academics, analysts, religious and community groups with information about main directions in Latin America and its links with the USA. NACLA studied the role of the USA relationships and foreign policy of it in Latin America. The reports of it were full of facts than analysis.
Under NACLA researches, the US - Cuban relations began in 1898 when the US joined Cuba in its war against Spain. Spain tried to keep its control over Cuba. But it had neither financial resource no men power to do it. Cuban people arose against Spanish invaders.
Guerilla forces were fighting in Cuba for ten years. The war was total. Spanish troops burnt and destroyed everything. Many thousands of Cubans died of hungry and illnesses. Those events reached the USA through newspapers. A lot of Americans became sure that the USA had to join Cuba in its war and helped Cubans to win independence.
At that time, the American battleship USS Maine in Havana harbor exploded and sank. The explosion aroused the public to demand war. On April 19, 1898 Congress adopted the resolution proclaiming Cuba free and independent; it demanded Spanish to leave Cuba. Congress allowed the President to use as much military force as he thought to help Cuban patriots to win freedom from Spain.
So, the war against Spain was declared. The Spanish-American war ended with the victory over Spain. In December 10, 1898, the Peace Negotiation between the USA and Spain was set in Paris. Cubans were only observers there. Cuba was guaranteed independence. But the US tried to do everything to limit new Cuban government and to barn any units with other countries.
The Senate adopted the Platt Amendment to an Army appropriations bill. That permitted the USA to interfere in Cuban affairs and to establish American naval base in Cuba. The Cuban Peace Treaty was the principle in Cuban American relations until 1934. Under the treaty of 1903 with Cuba the USA got a permanent permission to build a large naval base in Guantanamo Bay.
In 1906 the USA troops came back to Cuba. The head of the Cuban government was American, Charles E. Moon who governed Cuba until 1909. In 1933, a revolutionary group led by Fulgenmcio Batista seized the power. In 1934 the Platt Amendment was abolished. International investors began to invest in Cuba till 1950 s.
In 1934, women were given the right to vote and be elected in Cuba. In 1959, Batistas government was changed by Fidel Castro's forces. During all those times the relations between the USA and Cuba were strained. Since 1960, Cuba established friendly relationships with the Soviet Union. It played the role as the USSR representative in Africa and countries of Latin America. Those countries supported cold war of America against Cuba and the relationships with them worsened taking into account the fact that in 1961 Fidel Castro pronounced Cuba a Communist country.
The borders were closed. In April 1961, Cuban exiles tried to percolate through the Bay of Pigs but were stopped by Castro's army. The operation was organized by the U. S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). In 1962 a trade embargo against Cuba was started by the USA, because Fidel Castro's government took USA properties and there was Marxist-Leninist system.
So, the USA decided to set an embargo on Cuba, and in the following January it broke diplomatic relations with Cuba. It was forbidden to go to the country or to have business with it. Till the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 the trade with Cuba was limited. It was a long time of tension. The situation could have had a fatal end when in October 1962 the USSR secretly installed missiles in Cuba. The USA demanded to remove and dismantle the weapon.
Fortunately, The Soviet Union agreed to do it and that serious incident of the Cold War finished without victims. In 1970, the relationships between the USA and Cuba seemed to become normalizing but in 1975 there was a tension between two countries again. It happened because Cuba started to interfere into the home affaires of Angola. A year later, the country recognized Communist regime as the leading in the government and society.
A new Constitution of the country was adopted. The USA was not satisfied with the decision taken by Cuba but, in spite of it, later, in September, 1977, the USA and Cuba founded interests sections in their respective capitals. In 80 s, immigration problem was aroused. In April, 1980, the country let many criminals and mentally ill persons illegally immigrate to the United States. The case was called the "Mariel boat lift. At the times of Reagan governing, in 81 - 82, there were made some attempts to improve relationships between two countries, but Cuba's policy towards Grenada was not approved and thats why everything was left at their places.
Only after two years the USA and Cuba signed the agreement that made migration to the USA legal. But the United States insisted that those people, who came to America during Mariel boat lift, should return back to Cuba. Since that time many people migrated to the USA legally. After the breakdown of the Communist regime and the Soviet Union, Cuba suffered from great economic and socio-cultural problems. The Soviet Union was the main source of aid in this country. Cuba had to look for another country that would be able to help it.
Its closest powerful neighbor was the United States but the USA Cuban relations depended on migration. A lot of US criminals and political refugees found shelter in Cuba and moved back in any suitable opportunity. In 1990 s, the country had another migration crisis. But soon in 1993, Cuba tried to overcome difficulties and the government adopted economic reforms. It means that workers were allowed to start their own business. Under the Communist regime it was forbidden.
So, it was the first step to change home policy and political power. In 1994 food starvation caused demonstrations in Havana. The Cuban government allowed some 30, 000 Cubans to migrate to the USA by the sea. While crossing the sea on unsafe boats and rafts, many Cubans were sunk. In September 1994, and in May 1995, immigration treaty between the two countries was adopted. It made migration safe and legal.
On February 24, 1996, the relations between the USA and Cuba worsened because of the Cuban military attack on two US civil aircrafts. As a result of it three US citizens and a resident were killed. The Congress of the USA passed the Cuban liberty and Democratic solidarity Act. The USA introduced supplement sanctions on the Cuban regime and put Trade embargo into law. Nowadays, the US makes great efforts to transit democratic forms of governing. It keeps pressure on the Cuban government through economic sanctions, trying to make it respect human rights and develop civil society.
The USA takes measures in spreading peoples contacts, increasing direct flights and so on. The USA believes that Cuba continues giving refuge to those who escape from US justice. The United States advanced several political demands to new government. It should establish democratic conditions.
The USA insisted a stable and democratic government. The policy of the USA towards Cuba was based on the Liberated Act that guaranteed fulfillment of human rights and freedoms to Cuban people and on the embargo. Those measures had to be taken to develop a civil society in Cuba. The fundamental goal was to give support to the Cuban people. The USA is ready to give help if Cuban government makes fundamental, systematic democratic changes and human rights will not be violated. The other problem with Cuba is that a great amount of drugs is transported through the country.
Narcotraffickers use Cuban airspace and territorial waters. It is the best way to supply the United States with drugs from South America. And the third main problem is migration again. Cuba is a neighbor of the USA and thats why the United States should take measures to help Cuba to build new democratic society. It should make a contribution to the countrys rapid, peaceful, and democratic development. With this purpose the Council on Foreign Relations supports a bipartisan Independent Task Force on Cuba.
Independent Task Force studies business, political, religious and government affairs in the country. It helps greatly to establish new relations between the USA and Cuba. Having examined political, historical, economic processes in Cuba, we can come to conclusion that nowadays Cuba lives its own life, not like other countries. It seems to have two main political regimes: capitalist with democracy and former communist with the violation of freedoms and human rights. There is no still freedom of the press. Unions, political parties and all media are controlled by the government as well as the freedom of speech.
Opposition groups are rare and as a rule they are foreign. According to Amnesty International report, 1999, political pressure was characterized as ." subjected to psychological pressure, such as solitary confinement, long, intense interrogations, threats and insults and political system "fell far short of international standards of fairness. " But from the other side Cuba is one of the few countries that do not use torture, ill-treatment and murder by police and security forces. Most of all, according to the United Nations data, the country has a low level of poverty (4. 7 %). It means that the country pay great attention to health, knowledge, economic and social reforms.
Education is free in the country. Almost 99. 9 % of primary-school children go to school in Cuba. The level of education is rather high. After graduating from colleges almost 23 % of students make science careers. But the paradox is that many of them cannot find good and highly-paid job, and have to work hauling tourist suitcases. The level of medicine is high.
In 1993, the country was leading in number of doctors per people. Cuban economy is almost the only thing that recovers slowly after great changes. First of all, it was the 38 -year old U. S.
embargo that worsens the situation. The other thing is the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989. Cuba lost a great part of its gross domestic product (GDP), 35 %. Tourism became the way out of the situation. Paradoxically, Cuba has two economies today: a dollar economy and a Cuban peso economy. It goes without saying, that all processes that happened in Cuba played a great role on the formation of the nation and influenced all spheres of human life.
From one point of view, they worsened a situation; from other improved it. The United States helped to get rid from Spanish invention but it wanted to control all processes in the country. The USSR put its regime in Cuba but it helped Cuba. After the breakdown of the Soviet Union it was difficult for Cuba to live without the Ussr's support. So, it is for sure that the both styles of life, democratic and totalitarian, had their positive and negative after-effects. Bibliography: U.
S. - Cuba Relations. Fact Sheet. Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs. Washington, DC. May 1, 2001. Dianne, E.
Rennack; Mark, P. Sullivan. U. S. -Cuban Relations: An Analytic Compendium of U. S.
Policies, Laws & Regulations. Occasional Paper. Atlantic Council programs. March, 2005. web Edward, Gonzalez. After Castro: Alternative Regimes and U.
S. Policy. Cuba Transition Project. Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies. University of Miami, 2002.
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