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The Key to Normalization
| Article
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13849 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
Date : |
12 / 1988 |
1,943 Words |
| Author
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Jose Fernandez
José Fernandez is the associate dean of the School of
Languages and Linguistics at Georgetown University. |
Current U.S. policy toward Cuba is largely ineffective. Designed to foster internal difficulties for the Castro regime, promote its isolation, and restrain its activity; abroad it has met with very limited success, and at times it has been utterly counterproductive. After 30 years of failure and frustration, the situation appears to be ripe for a move in a new direction, and undoubtedly this is what many would-be policymakers have been pondering for the past few months. No one would make a unilateral move toward Fidel Castro, for such a move would be reckless and politically costly. But we may rest assured that by now the incoming administration must have received more than one memorandum advocating the reopening of discussions with Cuba for the purpose of making progress toward the normalization of relations between the two countries.
The climate prevailing in the world, moreover, seems to be propitious for such a shift. Almost everywhere—at least in the relevant areas of the world—events are moving at a rapid pace toward the relaxation of tensions and negotiations rather than confrontation. U.S.-Soviet relations are at a new high level of accommodation; Sandinistas and Contras are talking rather than shooting at each other in Nicaragua; the protracted war in Angola has entered a phase of multilateral conversations that just might culminate in the withdrawal of the Cuban forces from the area.
Even the escalating animosity that once characterized the Cuban policy of the Reagan administration has abated to the extent that ever-watchful Cuban exiles have begun to talk about secret understandings between Washington and Havana. One of the most significant events to elicit this sort of comment was the accord signed by the two
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