Panamanian disturbances, Cuban-American activism and the US antiwar movement

Is it delusion, arrogance, or both?

"Agents in the Miami office of the FBI rejoiced at the news. 'It was a dream come true,' said one agent, 'that all of the them were arrested in one fell swoop.'...Not long after the arrest, Justino di Celmo, the father of the Italian tourist killed in Havana by one of Posada's bombs, appeared on Cuban television to appeal to Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso not to allow Posada to go free."

Bardach, Ann Louise "Cuba Confidential: Love and Vengeance in Miami and Havana" An Assassin"s Tale in Three Acts. New York: Random House, 2002, 221

This retort was targeted for appearance in the previous edition of the Panama News. But unfortunately hurricane Isabel, which slammed through the Washington, DC-Maryland area preempted its delivery. At any rate, in 1999, after returning home from visiting family in Panama, I discovered The Panama News. And since then, over the course the past four years, of reading the online newspaper, I have refrained from responding to a number of ridiculous assertions in the letters section of the paper. But the following bombastic statement in the Vol. 9, 17th issue struck a nerve, and thus has broken my resistance.

"Why doesn't The Panama News talk about the injustice to the Cuban patriots? The Cuban Community will never forget what President Moscoso is doing to our patriots!!!"

I pose the following questions to author of the above letter: What evidence do you have to substantiate a claim of injustice perpetrated against the four Cuban men held in Panama? Is it possible for someone to be defined as patriot by the same set of actions --- the subject's actions that is --- which categorically defines them as a criminal?

The reality is that these detained men are unmistakably not your ordinary clandestine operatives who target specific persons for assassination. They are indiscriminate killers. There is a ubiquitous word for such persons --- terrorist! But of course many Cuban hard-liners, some of which are fanatics, would ridiculously characterize me as a Castro sympathizer --- which is pure nonsense!

What do we call an act that caused seventy-three people, including twenty members of Cuba's national fencing team, to go tumbling into the Caribbean Sea on October 1, 1976? --- a necessary evil to save Cuba or a killing of the very people who were in need of liberation?

Luis Posada Carriles --- a spent man who is permanently trapped in the Cold War era of the Bay of Pigs; someone who is now considered radioactive by even Republicans. One wonders whether he has reoccurring thoughts about the foregone possibility of personal success in South Florida --- as realized by many of his Cuban counterparts. Do you think he would now trade the shadowy world of a spook, for that of a pilot with Brothers to the Rescue? Perhaps! Are the actions of Posada an example of someone who is more passionately concerned about the state of his country, than those Cubans who choose to wage war against Fidel Castro's regime through political means? No, it's just his modus operandi.

However corrupt the Panamanian political elite is, I believe they have a lucid understanding of which issues resonate with the Panamanian electorate. Therefore, your proclamation of the strength of the Cuban Community's (Assumption: Cuban American Community) memory is of no consequence to the outgoing Moscoso. You see, the Cuban political muscle of south Florida is not transferable to Republic of Panama. Now, if there are favorable verdicts on the horizon for these defendants, it would have nothing to do with the influence of the "Cuban Community" and everything to do with the interest of the United States?

The Future

As Fidel and Raul Castro age, the approaching end of their tyrannical rein, becomes more apparent. Their deaths will inevitably bring about a dramatic shift in US-Cuba relations, but how will it affect Cuban-American politics?
Well, here are a number of predictions:

• The designation or term Cuban Exile will begin to wither and then expire.

• The small group of Cuban hard-liners who, more times than not, control Cuban-American politics through intimidation will rapidly become political impotent.

• Cuban-American politics will be no more, as result of it gradually folding into the conservative dimension of Latino politics.

• Absent the galvanizing issue of a liberated Cuba, those Cubans of a darker hue will feel less compelled to remain politically and socially bonded to their lighter-complexioned brethren. The result of which will be a realignment of political affiliations along the fault line of race. But this is certainly not a new construct for Black Hispanics, in that they have always shown a penchant for minting new relationships with other Black Hispanics and non-Hispanic blacks.

Finally, I applaud the producers of the television show Survivor for showing the world that Black Panamanians are not the stuff of myth. It's clearly a far cry from what the architects of the Miss Universe pageant did. But on second thought, I have to be very careful about showering the CBS producers with too much praise, because every program has its own purpose, function and effect.

Clarification

The following note is probably meaningless to most readers. But as a native New Yorker, I found the following paragraph from Saul Landau"s opinion column entitled "Guillermo Novo and me" a bit confusing. The firing location should have read Long Island City, which is a section of Queens, New York, as oppose to Long Island (Nassau & Suffolk counties).

(He waited for the time at which Cuba's Che Guevara was scheduled to address the UN General Assembly and then fired the shell "from the East River waterfront" in Long Island, facing the UN building across the river. The shell, said the Times, "landed in the East River about 200 yards short of the 38-story United Nations Secretariat building, sending up a 15-foot geyser of water.")

Mr. Ray Lauazzana has waaaayy too much time on his hands. He also does not understand that in past times of war, the US always treats POWs the way it is now holding the Al Quaida suspects in Gitmo. Their living conditions are not as bad as some folks would like you to believe and in the beginning, was better than the living conditions of the reservists who were there to guard them. You have every right to publish this man's letter but he is way off base on what he has written.

The current administration is only trying to correct the mess left by the previous administration with their grasping at any agreement or treaty which would weaken the position of the US in the world. The "Greenies" of the world would love to take from us, the US what they envy most: our freedom, our middle class power, our ability to succeed in the face of adverstiy and our national wealth. They will not be successful. The world is finding out what the US can do when we are attacked and will soon be seeing more. What did Clinton-Gore do when we were attacked? Next to nothing and nothing that was effective.

Thank you for your efforts and your on line paper. I love Panama and very much enjoy reading what you write every issue. You are the hardest working man in journalism. God bless you and your efforts!

letters

Three takes on three protest movements, etc.