To Make a World Safe for Revolution:
White, Robert E
BOOKS The formidable Fidel TO HUE 1WOBLD SITE FOB BEV0LDTI01I Jorge I. Domfnguez Harvard University Press, $35, 365 pp. Robert E. White uba is a small country but it has the foreign policy of a...
...Cuba, he insists, will accept the norms of international conduct provided the U.S...
...To Make a World Safe for Revolution delivers a coherent, unemotional, but powerful account of the development of Cuba's foreign relations since the Castro revolution...
...In the five long, intense, often combative discussions I have had with Fidel Castro, he has never quoted from the law or the prophets of communism, never mentioned Marx or Lenin, never lapsed into jargon of any kind...
...It would be a simpler world if Castro functioned as Moscow's puppet In truth, it has been Cuba that has moved Soviet policy toward greater support for revolution...
...Take, for example, the case of Angola...
...As Domfnguez points out, this is in large part because most of the revolutionary movements Cuba has supported have grown out of local conditions and did not, as in the case of the Nicaraguan contras, owe their existence to the initiative of a foreign power...
...portant work...
...In response to official criticism from the U.S., Castro states that those who export counterrevolution have no right to demand that Cuba abandon rebels who seek to overthrow oppressive governments...
...It is a mistake to underestimate the power of the promise of economic and social transformation to the ground-down poor of countries where, too often, so-called democratic government acts as a device to frustrate authentic change...
...He believes there is no subject beyond his mastery, no challenge that will not yield to his prescriptions...
...What afflicts the United States in its dealings with nearby revolutionary states is not a failure of will, but a failure of analysis...
...Castro's commitment to revolution is real but limited...
...According to this interpretation, the Soviet Union sends Cuban troops into strategic areas to advance its own imperialist designs...
...If we can deal rationally with Fidel Castro, then it may become possible to assess our security interests unemotionally and accurately throughout the entire region...
...On the other hand, from a third-world vantage point, Cuba has forged a society where the health and education of the people are given first priority, where no one goes hungry, where there is work for all...
...We must overcome the temptation to regard Cuba as a mere outpost of the Soviet Union...
...He will not assist revolution against friendly progressive governments such as Mexico, nor will he criticize right-wing regimes that help Cuba, such as Franco's Spain...
...Robert E. White uba is a small country but it has the foreign policy of a great power...
...This assessment of Fidel Castro by the Cuban-bom Domfnguez squares with my own experience...
...the spirit of the knight errant, of righting wrongs everywhere, of fighting against giants...
...There is no better place to begin than by reading this important work...
...This image has crowded out the equally important reality of a country properly proud of its accomplishments at home and abroad, pragmatic, self-confident, and eager for a civilized relationship with the United States...
...In response to the aggressive policies of the U.S., Cuba does frequently fill the role of the truculent upstart, Yankee-baiting, Soviet-parroting, emphasized by Washington...
...Indeed, a good case can be made that Castro's talents and ambitions are too great for Cuba to contain, that they require a world stage and that under his guidance, Cuba has become the first developing country in history to play an important international role...
...This image of Cuba as a simple surrogate of Moscow will not stand up to serious analysis...
...Asked to define a revolutionary, Castro gives us a self-portrait of the Fidel he wants the world to see: "Don Quijote's madness and the madness of the revolutionary are similar...
...Castro dreaming the impossible dream, playing David to our Goliath, has always explained more about the Cuban caudillo than categorizing him as a tool of Moscow...
...Romanticized and self-serving this image may be, but according to Jorge Domfnguez's ground-breaking study, Cuba's foreign policy is inspired more by Castro's revolutionary vision than by Communist dogma or Soviet manipulation...
...policymakers have continually complained that Cuba mixes into the affairs of nations such as Ethiopia and Yemen where it has no conceivable security interests...
...In 1975, Cuba sent its troops to rescue the beleaguered Marxist government reeling from the combined opposition of the U.S...
...and South Africa...
...Undoubtedly, Castro is an adversary, but he is an adversary of impressive intellectual range and power...
...would try to overthrow his government, Castro exaggerated his commitment to Marxism-Leninism in order to capture and hold Soviet support...
...Instead, we must make a determined effort to understand the complexities of the Castro revolution and its continued appeal to those who fight for change in Central America and elsewhere...
...Any intelligent policy toward the Caribbean and Central America must involve a change in our policy of attempting to isolate Cuba and destroy its revolution- a policy which has demonstrably failed...
...Soon Cuba had 36,000 troops in Angola fighting both the U.S.-backed insurgency of Jonas Savimbi and, ultimately, South African troops...
...A quick summary might go as follows: Convinced that the U.S...
...To explain this seemingly irrational conduct, the State Department has cast Cuba in the role of the monkey who dances to the tune of the Soviet organ grinder...
...A visitor to Cuba is struck by the state's monopoly of power, the lack of press freedom, and the absence of any guarantees of human rights...
...Cuba accepted Soviet hegemony because it provided Castro with both the resources and the protection necessary to maintain his rule at home and advance revolution around the world...
...At various times over the past twenty-five years, Cuba has projected its power effectively not only into Latin America, but into Africa and the Middle East as well...
...Since 1959, the destinies of Cuba have been, guided by Fidel Castro...
...Castro has suffered setbacks in his attempts to support revolutionary Marxist governments and movements throughout the third world, yet his overall record of success is impressive...
...As Domfnguez points out, Castro has near-total faith in his own capacities...
...also abides by those same norms...
...Fourteen years later, with the United States and the Soviet Union dancing in attendance, Cuban representatives negotiated a treaty which insures the survival of the Angolan government, spells finish for Savimbi's UNITA, moves South African troops out' of Angola, and provides for the independence of Namibia...
Vol. 116 • May 1986 • No. 10
