Marifeli Perez-Stable

Published in The Miami Herald
August 14, 2008

Taking the long view on U.S.-Cuba relations isn’t easy. In my two most recent columns, I laid out in broad strokes the long historical arc as I see it. My basic point is simple: The United States and Cuba have never had normal relations. To make an eventual rapprochement possible, both need to think outside the box.

As it stands now, U.S. policy is unlikely to bring about a democratic Cuba. Though most in order among adversaries, U.S.-Cuba diplomacy has been notoriously absent under President Bush. In his second term, he has wisely moved his foreign policy toward the center. Cuba, however, remains an exception. In contrast, all U.S. administrations since Gerald Ford’s have held talks with Havana.

Confrontation with the United States has been useful to Fidel Castro. Without it, the regime would not be able to conjure up ”imperialism” as an excuse for its monumental failures. Thus, Castro has sometimes sought an improvement in relations only to torpedo the prospect at a convenient moment.

Allow family visits

In 1996, for example, the murderous downing of the Brothers to the Rescue planes promoted quick passage of Helms-Burton (or Helms-Castro). A watered-down version would not have served the Fidelista purpose of always painting the United States in the worst possible light.

All the same, the record in the 1970s and in the late 1980s is more ambiguous. While unwilling to sacrifice its activist foreign policy, Havana did manifest a willingness to mend relations with Washington. In the talks that put an end to armed conflict in southern Africa, the United States and Cuba worked together constructively.

I heartily welcome Sen. Barack Obama’s promise to grant Cuban Americans unrestricted rights to visit family and send remittances if he wins in November. Should Sen. John McCain be elected, I’d hope he would reconsider the 2004 measures that have so burdened Cuban families across the Florida Straits.

Polarizations create comfort zones where adversaries aren’t challenged to do anything differently. For almost five decades, that’s where the United States and Cuba have often been.

Let’s say the next U.S. administration eases restrictions on travel and remittances. Should Washington ex pect Havana to call for free elections in response? Not if the purpose is to pull back from the line in the sand.

Freeing all political prisoners is, on the other hand, doable. If the United States takes the first step and Cuba does nothing or, worse, continues to throw peaceful opponents in jail, the ball would be in its court. U.S. overtures to the European Union, Canada and Latin America might then find more willing ears.

How can the United States and Cuba learn to live in peace? Not all at once, that’s for sure. Slow, incremental steps are needed to build trust, not the kind we have among friends but the kind we need to resolve conflicts.

At the end of the road lies the prospect of normal relations for the first time ever. The United States and a democratic Cuba will not dispel overnight more than half a century of mistrust. That’s why the United States needs to gain a consideration of Cuban sensibilities along the way.

Turning the Guantánamo naval base over to a democratically elected president of Cuba would provide Cuban nationalism a psychological victory that would help normalize relations. In the meantime, it is worth remembering Henry Kissinger’s words to the U.S. diplomats dealing with Cuba in the mid-1970s: “Do it like a big guy, not like a shyster.”

Cuba, in turn, needs to turn geographic nearness into an asset. Confrontation — for which Havana also must accept responsibility — has exacted the heaviest toll from ordinary Cubans. Under Raúl Castro, Cuba remains a dictatorship, but opportunities to ease tensions might still arise. If so, I hope for a useful give and take that helps the Cuban people look beyond their current circumstances.

Two concluding thoughts. Cubans everywhere should finally mind Manuel Márquez Sterling, an early 20th-century diplomat-journalist: ”A civic government is the definitive expression of consolidated independence.” We should, moreover, be thankful that Cuba is 90 miles from the United States. Ask the Poles how they did for centuries so close to Germany and Russia.

Marifeli Pérez-Stable is vice president for democratic governance at the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C., and a professor at Florida International University.