Raising more questions than it answers, 90-year-old former Cuban dictator Fidel Castro succumbed to lingering illness dying of old age Nov. 25. Admired by communist revolutionaries around the globe, Castro came to power Jan. 1, 1959 after he led a band of Latin American Revolutionaries, including Argentine-born Ernest Ché Guevara, to topple the U.S.-backed Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista. Like other communist revolutionaries of his era, Castro talked-the-talk about the evils of capitalism, only to wind up governing with Stalinist brutality, liquidating all opposition. Castro was no different, once his idealist socialist revolution was replaced by the tyrannical Stalinist rule. Mass deportations, detentions, torture, vaporizations and confiscation of personal property became Castro’s legacy in Cuba, not the glamorous picture of a man championing the plight of the poor.
Cuban under Castro became more impoverished than before the Revolution as Castro drove legitimate businesses and entrepreneurs off the island only 90 miles from Key West, Florida. Like other charismatic dictators, Castro hid behind socialist ideals to implement his Stalinist takeover of Cuba, destroying Cuba’s free press, stifling dissent and implementing a brutal form of martial law. “History will record and judge the enormous impact of this singular figure on the people and world around him,” said U.S. President Barack Obama, reacting to Fidel’s death. Since turning over the presidency to his younger brother Raul Castro Feb. 24, 2008 because of illness, nothing changed in Cuba other than window dressing. Cuba under Raul made no effort to free political prisoners, develop a free press, accept dissent and end Fidel’s Stalinist rule of its 11.3 million inhabitants.
Since meeting with Raul Castro April 11, 2015, Obama sought by executive order to normalize U.S. relations with Cuba, including reopening embassies in Washington and Cuba Aug. 14, 2015. Over the objections of the U.S.-exile Cuban community, Obama believed normalizing relations was preferable to the Oct. 19, 1960 embargo signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, realizing that Fidel was indeed a communist revolutionary loyal of the Kremlin. Once the embargo took place, Fidel turned to the Soviet Union for economic support, pledging loyalty to the Kremlin in exchange for cash and military support. By the time President John F. Kennedy ordered the failed Bay of Pigs invasion April 17, 1961, less than four months after taking office, Cuba was already Moscow’s puppet, violating the U.S. Truman Doctrine, preventing communist revolution in the Western Hemisphere.
Pushing to normalize relations, Obama saw only good in restoring economic ties to Castro’s island prison. Obama didn’t get that without some democratic reforms, it was difficult to conduct business-as-usual with the Castro boys. Obama’s pro-Castro crowd wanted to restore relations at any cost, no matter how many Cuban exiles living in South Miami they offended. “The Chinese people have lost a close comrade and sincere friend,” said Chinese President Xi Jingping, exposing the true face of Chinese communism. Xi’s comments expose the hypocritical nature of U.S. trade relations with China, where the U.S. suffers from a $500 billion trade deficit. Cuban exiles in South Florida don’t see the hypocrisy of maintaining normal traded relations with China while preserving an economic embargo with Cuba. U.S. officials haven’t really prevailed on China to improve human rights.
Speaking about Fidel’s death, 70-year-old President-elect Donald Trump echoed the Cuban exile community. “Fidel Castro’s legacy is one of firing squads, theft, unimaginable suffering, poverty and the denial of fundamental human rights,” said Trump, undermining Obama’s attempt to normalize relations. Depicted as a bearded army fatigue-clad, cigar-smoking revolutionary, Fidel knew the PR game, promoting himself as a revolutionary hero. Never short of words, especially criticism of the U.S., Castro broke the U.N. record Oct. 10, 1960 with a 269-minute speech, largely touting communism, denouncing U.S. capitalism. No one can figure out how Fidel helped the Cuban economy by destroying private enterprise, especially the tourist industry. If history’s any judge, as Fidel insists, he single-handedly destroyed the Cuban economy for totalitarian rule.
Boasting about improving education and health care in Cuba, Fidel spewed the propaganda but actually destroyed economic opportunity, institutionalizing poverty in Cuba. Rumored to have survived up to 600 CIA-backed assassination attempts, Fidel denied knowing anything about the Nov. 22, 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Castro once insisted the Lee Harvey Oswald could not have killed Kennedy. Recently declassified material places Oswald two weeks before the assassination meeting with Cuban agents in Mexico City. Sending Cuban revolutionaries to Africa and South America, Castro helped spread communism around the globe. Rewarded by the Kremlin with cash-and-arms until the Soviet Union collapsed Dec. 26, 1991, Cuba lapsed into its deepest poverty ever since. Cuba’s government now wants to canonize Fidel as a socialist hero, not a tyrannical dictator.
