Voice of Reason: It’s time to end Cuban embargo
I love irony. It’s one of those things that keeps life interesting. And one would be hard pressed to find an institution more ironic (some might say hypocritical) than the U.S. Government.
For decades during the Cold War, our government condemned the nations of the Soviet bloc, and rightly so, for their refusal to let their citizens travel freely abroad.
Isn’t is funny, then, that our government is continuing to do exactly the same thing.
Case in point is Cuba, where since the early 1960s a travel (and trade) embargo has been enforced against the communist nation.
From a liberty and educational standpoint, this travel embargo is particularly disturbing. Travel, after all, is perhaps the best form of education available. And the ability to travel to other lands, to see conditions there, meet the local peoples and share ideas and opinions with them ultimately affects the way a free people choose their form of government. So what has our government to fear from Cuba?
The government’s official reason for these sanctions, according to the State Department, “is to promote a peaceful transition to a stable, democratic form of government and respect for human rights” in Cuba.
A noble reason, certainly, but one which doesn’t quite jibe with our government’s practice of dealing with most other repressive states. Take China, for example. Here’s one of the most repressive, non-democratic states on the planet, one which killed hundreds of student protesters in 1989’s Tiananmen Square massacre and continues to execute and imprison dissidents at an alarming rate. And how does our government reward China for this stellar human rights record? By granting the country Most Favored Nation trading status!
But as funny as it sounds, perhaps this is the way to deal with such states. As 40 years of failed policy has shown, our government’s isolation of Cuba has done nothing to weaken Castro and bring democracy to the island nation just 90 miles off the Florida coast. If anything, the embargo has strengthened Castro and served only to bring additional misery to the Cuban people.
Like Castro today, communist governments during the Cold War knew if their citizens were exposed to the liberties and freedoms of the West that they would soon be clamoring for the same at home. Again, China is a perfect example. With increased trade and travel, beginning with Nixon’s famous trip, the world’s largest communist state has begun to show signs of modifying its economic policy to include a many capitalistic features. And this move, in turn, I think, will bring additional personal freedoms to the Chinese people as they begin to get a better grasp on how people in capitalist nations live and the kinds of freedoms we (for the most part) enjoy.
As we’ve dealt with China, so we should deal with Cuba. It is only through the institutions of trade and travel that our government can guide Cuba to a more democratic, liberal form of government.
Despite the fact a majority of Americans now favors lifting the embargo against Cuba, and Congress has passed bills lifting at least the travel ban, the embargo stays, thanks in large part to the political leverage of South Florida’s conservative Cuban-American community, which has been able to successfully lobby every president since Kennedy.
But the fact remains that the U.S. embargo gives Castro his only excuse for the failure of his 44-year reign. This is on top of the billions of dollars the embargo is depriving the U.S. economy through the agricultural, energy and travel sectors.
It’s time for the Cuban embargo to end. It’s been 43 years since Eisenhower instituted the first act of the embargo. It purpose has yet to be achieved. It’s time to try something new.
(Will Stewart is a reporter for the Standard. He can be reached at 473-2191 or by e-mail at education@southernstandard.com.)