Harry Targ
The United Nations General Assembly approved a
resolution Friday, August 3, 2012, that The
New York Times said, “severely criticized the Syrian government, blaming it
almost exclusively for the killings and other atrocities that have come to
shape the 17-month uprising there.”
The resolution condemning Syria ironically implied
that it was that country that refused to carry out the peace plan that was
proposed four months earlier by Kofi Annan. No mention was made in the
resolution that the United States, Britain, France, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar,
among others had been feeding supplies to anti-government militias that
encouraged them to violence rather than negotiation. While 133 Western and Arab
League allies voted for the resolution, 33 countries abstained, and 12 voted
“no.” These were portrayed as Syria’s “slim group of backers, which include
Russia, China, and Iran.”
Syria is a dictatorship that in the recent civil war
has leveled brutal violence against its own people. But the Syrian Ambassador
was correct in asserting that those who sponsored the resolution condemning
violence were the same nations that had “played a major role in the
militarization of the situation in Syria, by providing weapons to the terrorist
groups.”
It is not surprising that The New York Times failed
to mention that Cuba has been one of the longstanding critics of U.S. inspired
wars on weak countries such as Libya and now Syria. The Cuban Permanent
Representative to the United Nations, Pedro Nunez Mosquera, warned that the
resolution which was adopted would encourage more violence from the opposition
and retaliation by the state. With growing instability, he asserted, foreign
intervention would become legitimized the way it was in the Libyan case.
In an article in Prensa
Latina, the Cuban diplomat’s position was summarized: “Cuba considers that
all acts of violence, massacres and terrorist acts that claim innocent lives in
Syria should cease” but this will require that the anti-Syrian coalition “must
put an end to arms smuggling and money to insurgent groups and their training.”
Nunez also criticized the major Western media’s one-sided reporting on the
violence in Syria.
It is clear that Cuba’s criticisms of the wars on
Libya and Syria and the Western economic blockade and military threats toward
Iran are motivated by self-interest as well as principle. Cuba, as a country
that has suffered an economic blockade by the United States for over fifty
years and a U.S. policy designed to diplomatically isolate it, sees
similarities between its experiences and U.S. policies toward Syria and Libya.
Despite some U.S. liberalization of travel to the
island nation, government agencies and counter-revolutionary organizations in
Miami continue to funnel funds, technology, and propaganda to create an
opposition that, they hope, will lead to an armed resistance against the Cuban
government. If the Cuban government responds to terrorist acts, a U.S
orchestrated coalition of dependent allies can justify the transfer of arms, propaganda
campaigns, and escalating calls for revolution.
What may be called today “The Libyan Model of
Destabilization” is not new to Cubans and as a result they see the necessity of
continued vigilance. Alan Gross, hired by the United States Agency for
International Development, was caught distributing computer technology to
selected communities on the island. A global propaganda campaign was raised
about a recent car accident in which two well-known opponents of the regime who
were traveling with rightwing Europeans in the countryside were killed. No
evidence of foul play was provided concerning the accident although charges by Miami
Cubans of government violence have been broadly distributed. Also a recent
Miami scholarly conference was organized with presentations by counter-revolutionaries
who argued that the recent economic reforms on the island will never work. And repeatedly
U.S. and British media highlight alleged growing disenchantment with the
regime.
The Libyan Model of Destabilization, which has its
roots in the years of economic blockade of Cuba, terrorist acts and assassination
plots, the creation of counter-revolutionary groups in Florida and New Jersey,
and even an armed invasion, is not likely to work in the Cuban case. First, the
Cuban regime has broad popular support. Second, Cuba’s first priority remains
social and economic justice. Third, Cuban health care and education is among
the best in the Global South.
And, finally, Cuba remains an inspiration to those
countries throughout the Western Hemisphere (such as Venezuela, Bolivia,
Ecuador, Nicaragua, Argentina, Brazil, and El Salvador) who seek to create
political and economic autonomy in the twenty-first century. As evidenced in
positions taken at the recent Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia,
Latin American countries defended Cuban national sovereignty and are demanding
that the latter be included in future meetings of Hemisphere nations.
But as the Libyan model and now the Syria crisis
suggest, weak countries everywhere in the world must remain vigilant.
Imperialism still survives.
