...one of the big problems that the U.S. has in Latin America is that every country down there has ganged up on us--Former UN Ambassador Bill Richardson,CNN, Dec. 18, 2014
It was only minutes, if not seconds, after the startling news of renewed diplomatic relations between Cuba and the U.S. that the pols and pundits started jabbering about bringing “democracy” to the “enslaved” island.
In other words, after 54 years they hadn’t learned a damned thing, let alone changed their imperial ways. Don’t they know that Washington and Wall Street's (WWS) long and nasty record of spawning dictatorships makes their prattle about “democracy” a sick joke? Do they think that Cuba and the rest of the continent forgot the Bay of Pigs invasion, the 1962 missile crisis and the decades of bombings, open assaults and covert ops targeting the “enslaved” Cubans? Or the countless efforts to kill Cuba’s leaders, sabotage its industries, poison its crops and scare away foreign tourists with bloody terrorist attacks on hotels and airliners? And what about the continuing vicious economic blockade openly aimed at starving Cuba into surrender?
At first, most of Latin America, with the honorable exception of Mexico, went along with the relentless WWS anti-Castro crusade. But as decades passed, the U.S.-favored dictatorships in the region collapsed, replaced by democratic and increasingly leftist governments that established friendly diplomatic and trade relations with Cuba. This seriously undermined the WWS economic blockade. Washington was further vexed by the overwhelming opposition to the blockade by the whole world (The last UN resolution condemning Washington passed 188 to 2, with just Israel and its U.S. client accounting for the two).
Meanwhile, Cuba, by its example of dogged independence and heroic opposition to imperialism, had become a leader in Latin America. In 2012, it was unanimously voted president for a two-year term of CELAC, the Community of Latin American and Caribbean Nations, which includes every country in the western hemisphere with the deliberate exception of the U.S. and Canada. That’s what ambassador Richardson meant about their “ganging up on us.”
In the end, the strategy to isolate Cuba was turned on its head with Washington isolated instead. Hence, the effort to try to regain a measure of influence by finally recognizing the reality of Cuba.
What those jabbering pols and pundits haven’t learned is that Cuba’s form of government is Cuba’s business. On that, all of Latin America agrees. Even rightwing Columbia, supposedly the last, best ally of WWS in the region, supports the gathering drive for continental independence and unity. There is no longer any reason, if there ever was, for Latin America to accept servile status in the Yanqui “backyard.” Spain and Portugal once ruled the continent. Today, they are just a memory. The same fate awaits the colossus to the north.
