History
in this parallel universe unfolded a bit differently
December
6, 1960
WASHINGTON (Gloomberg News) – Ignoring
sanctions imposed by the U.S.S.R., President Dwight D. Eisenhower recognized
Cuba as an "independent, sovereign, and democratic nation" on Monday, presenting
a bold challenge to Moscow that further escalated East-West tensions.
The brief White House press release came
just hours after the Kremlin announced asset freezes and other sanctions
against U.S. officials involved in the Cuban crisis. Soviet Premier Nikita Krushchev warned that
more would follow if the United States didn't stop interfering in Cuba.
The Soviet bloc has struggled to
find leverage to force Washington to back off in the Cuba turmoil. However, analysts saw Monday’s sanctions as
mostly ineffectual. A high-ranking
official within the Soviet Foreign Ministry conceded to Gloomberg News that
there’s little the Soviets can do from a military standpoint, given that Cuba sits
so squarely within the United States’ own back yard.
Washington showed no signs of blinking
in the dispute that has roiled Cuba since American-backed troops took control
of the island nation early last month. A
Cuban referendum on Sunday overwhelmingly supported the U.S. intervention and called
for annexation by the United States. Recognizing
Cuba as independent and democratic could be the first step in declaring the
country a U.S. territory. Bills to
authorize such a move already are pending in both the House and Senate.
Cuba has long been firmly within the
American sphere of influence. After the
U.S. victory in the Spanish-American war, U.S. forces occupied Cuba from 1899
to 1902, and then again from 1906 to 1909.
Annexation at that time was forbidden by an act of Congress, but America's political
and economic influence remained strong until the Cuban revolution brought Fidel
Castro to power two years ago. Prior to
the partial U.S. embargo announced in mid-October, Cuba bought 70% of its
foreign goods from the U.S.
Reacting to the Soviet attempt to
punish America for its intervention, U.S. Under Secretary of State C. Douglas
Dillon called the sanctions "a reflection of a pathological unwillingness
to acknowledge reality and a desire to impose on everyone one-sided and
unbalanced approaches that absolutely ignore reality."
The Kremlin imposed asset freezes and
travel restrictions on seven U.S. officials and friends of the president, most notably
White House Chief of Staff Wilton Persons, Commerce Secretary Frederick H.
Mueller, and Vice President Richard Nixon, who has been a vocal opponent of the
Castro regime. Nixon told Gloomberg News
he was unimpressed. “Like I have
investments in Russia,” he scoffed, “or would ever want to go there. People are interested in traveling from Russia, not to it. Why do you think they built the Berlin Wall? It wasn’t to keep people out.”
Joking with reporters prior to a meeting
of his cabinet, President Eisenhower was equally dismissive of the
sanctions. “We should keep our distance
from those people who compromise us,” he said, in a tongue-in-cheek reference to the
officials on the sanctions list, some of whom were present at the cabinet
meeting.
In a brief conversation with
reporters, President-elect John F. Kennedy made it clear that he fully backs the
U.S. intervention. He had a terse
reaction to the Soviet complaints. “Too
bad. After all, we've been the ones
who've been pushed around lately.” Over
the course of the past several months, Cuba has nationalized without
compensation hundreds of millions of dollars worth of U.S. property, slapped exorbitant
taxes and surcharges on U.S. goods, and has refused to pay overdue bills for
previous imports. But while Kennedy endorsed
the incursion, he repeated a criticism he had leveled during the campaign. "If the president had been smarter about Cuba
over the last several years, it never would have come to this.”
Following the announcement of the
Soviet sanctions, several Red puppet states followed suit with freezes and
travel restrictions of their own. "We
need to show solidarity with Cuba, and therefore the United States leaves us no
choice," Polish Foreign Minister Adam Rapacki said in Warsaw.
U.S. allies generally have been quietly
supportive of the U.S. intervention. Within
hours of Eisenhower’s Monday announcement, British Prime Minister Harold
Macmillan released a statement saying, "In the long term, the biggest
challenge will be to build a strong Cuban economy, rooted in strong institutions
that respect the rule of law.” Major
Latin American governments, as they had done earlier with the trade embargo, privately supported
the White House announcement, but did not say so publicly, fearing Castro’s
popularity with their own people.
However, the allied support has not been unanimous. Canadian Prime Minister John Diefenbaker, who
in the past has been openly critical of the Eisenhower administration’s handling
of Cuba, released a statement distancing his government from the U.S. “It is Canada’s long-standing position not to
interfere in others' internal affairs,” the statement read. “We respect the independence, sovereignty and
territorial integrity of Cuba.”
Within hours of the U.S.
announcement, former Cuban premier Fidel Castro, who fled to Moscow last month along
with other members of his revolutionary government, bitterly decried the decision. “I’m personally addressing President Eisenhower
and demanding that he stop his provocations immediately and call back the
troops from the Republic of Cuba,” Castro said.
He also complained that soldiers now on the ground in the country are wearing
military camouflage fatigues devoid of insignia, an apparent violation of the
Geneva Conventions, and he demanded that the United Nations investigate the
matter and impose the appropriate sanctions.
The U.N. did not immediately respond to that request. It’s not the first time the Castro regime has
appealed to the United Nations. In October,
Cuban Foreign Minister Raúl Roahe warned the U.N. that an invasion was imminent,
saying that American military already had begun dropping arms into the country.
The Eisenhower administration has
not admitted the soldiers now controlling key points within Cuba are members of
the U.S. military. Some of the soldiers Gloomberg
News reporters have encountered in the field speak Spanish with Cuban accents, but
the majority obviously are American. It’s
believed the troops are under the control of the CIA, which is rumored to have
been training Cuban exiles and making other invasion preparations for months.
Last month’s incursion came amid growing
concerns that Cuba was increasingly aligning itself with the Soviet bloc. Castro
has vehemently denied being a communist.
However, in a four and a half hour speech before the United Nations
General Assembly in mid-October, Castro railed against the United States, while
at the same time endorsing Soviet positions on several international issues, thereby
placing his country firmly on the side of the Reds. And as if to dispel any remaining doubt
about where he stood, before boarding a Soviet-supplied Il-18 turboprop to fly
home from the U.N. appearance, Castro declared, “The Soviets are our friends.” The U.S. incursion happened as Cuban economic
czar Ernesto ("Che") Guevara was in to Moscow trying to negotiate even
more trade deals with the Reds.
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If you like this form of satire, please out my other novels, particularly Messages, which applies much the same kind of treatment to the news industry.
©2014 by Forrest Carr. All rights reserved.
©2014 by Forrest Carr. All rights reserved.
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