Socialist Cuba’s military dictatorship is licking its chops in the hope Joe Biden wins the U.S. presidential election. They know under Biden the U.S. cash spigots will be turned back on and they’ll become even richer and more powerful.
By Roberto Alvarez Quiñones in Diario de Cuba (my translation):
Castro military leaders will become richer with a change in U.S. policy
Raul Castro and his dictatorial team are very happy with the polls showing Biden has the advantage.
Who will win the U.S. election in the next few days, Donald Trump or Joe Biden?
No one knows, but Raul Castro and his dictatorial team are very happy because the polls are giving some advantage to Biden, who has proposed that if he wins the White House, he’ll lift the sanctions imposed by Trump and return to Barack Obama’s policies of rapprochement with the Castro dictatorship.
Castro and his team are assuming Biden will win and have already begun moving their intelligence officials and their “friends of Cuba” in the U.S. to reinforce the pro-Castro lobby in Washington.
You don’t have to be cynical to believe the notion that concessions and money to empower private businesses can cause political instability or even the end of the dictatorship, and the Castro elite are not crazy about that. In fact, they congratulated Joe Biden and Kamala Harries (via the state-owned site Cubadebate) when they were nominated as the candidates for the Democrat Party.
Biden would ignore Obama’s massive failure. The Castros (while Fidel was still alive) received important concessions, including the return of the five spies from the Wasp Network, and in return bit the hand of the U.S. president instead of taking advantage of the improvement in bilateral relations. That “thaw” resulted in more human rights violations and the financing of the military state that controls the economy, in addition to a step backwards in the minuscule space provided for private businesses.
The penetration and influence of the pro-Castro left
Those advocating a return to the smiles and concessions to Havana are divided into two camps: 1) those who — despite the previous failure — believe that now it will work, and 2) the hard left and those who are pro-Castro and admire (without admitting it) the Cuban regime for standing up to Washington and the democratic values that many of them reject.
The Castro dictatorship’s spies in the U.S. know that a Biden administration would be more penetrated and influenced by the radical socialist left and pro-Castro contingent than that of Obama’s and that they will obtain positions in the State Department and other government agencies.
The regime is also betting that if the Democrat Party wins the majority in both houses of congress, the embargo will be lifted. Kamala Harris has already insisted it has to end, but that’s a separate topic to be analyzed.
It is not clear a new Democrat administration would ask Havana for anything in exchange for concessions (just lifting sanctions would be a concession). However, due to the profound economic crisis and the increase in popular discontent, the dictatorship may find itself obligated to make concessions (it never has before) if they are demanded. But those would be shallow and short term only to avoid the crisis from worsening and an uprising, never to make actual structural or political changes.
Washington (and above all the Democrat Party) should finally get around to understanding that general Castro and his military claque will not leave power if they are not pressured and obligated to do so.
Continue reading (in Spanish) HERE.