Why opening relations with Cuba is a great idea
Photo from flickr.com
In the past year, President Barack Obama has made historic steps to reopen relations with Cuba.
This spring he visited Havana and Raúl Castro to symbolize the budding peace between our country and the island nation only 90 miles south of us. This trip finally opened a dialogue between the two country’s leaders, but it is still necessary for Congress to lift decades old trade embargos.
Before the Communist Revolution, the United States had been heavily involved with its neighbor through the trade of agricultural goods and tourism.
The United States intervened where it should not have, which is a historical pattern, and helped to elect Fulgencio Batista for the presidency. Upon his second term, he was no longer a president but a dictator, exploiting the Cuban people to keep himself in power.
In a reaction to this lack of political and civil liberties, the Cuban people were seeking empowerment in a time when Marxism was popular. After overthrowing the corrupt dictator Batista in 1959, Fidel Castro rose to power.
In order to express our disapproval with the new leftist leader, we implemented trade embargos and closed embassies. According to TIME Magazine, before these embargos, Cuba had been getting 70% of its imports from the States. When this supply was cut off, they were forced to reach out to the Soviet Union for economic help, strengthening their ties and causing further militaristic tensions between the U.S. and Cuba.
Since the Cold War ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1991, not much progress has been made to restore relations with the former Soviet ally. Since Fidel Castro retired and left his position to his brother Raúl in 2008, however, change has come naturally.
Raúl has historically been a more moderate and quiet leader than his brother, encouraging those who support ending the embargos.
As it turns out, those hoping for change are in the majority. The United Nations has formally denounced the U.S. embargo every year since 1991, and according to BBC, Pope Benedict XVI even said in 2012 that the embargo “unfairly burdens” the Cuban people.
Much of this burden comes from the economic restriction in place. According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the restrictive policies cost the U.S. $1.2 billion in sales annually. But it is not just about America’s ability to profit.
The Cuban people could also benefit from the opening of drug and agriculture markets. In a report from the American Association for World Health they found that Cuban health care professionals have access to less than 50% of the drugs on the world market. This hurts the Cuban people directly by limiting treatment possibilities for those who are sick and suffering.
Furthermore, these policies have been in place for over 50 years and have not seen the desired results.
According to a poll taken in 2011 by the Cuban Research Institute, 80% of Cuban Americans said the embargo has not worked very well or at all. To better promote democracy in Cuba, openness and not isolation is going to help. To prohibit Americans from traveling to Cuba in an effort to spread freedom and democracy is hypocritical, and furthermore, the U.S. government allows travel to many other nations with which we have significant ideological conflicts.
Rather than continuing to try a top-down approach to spread democracy to Cuba, the United States should allow economic and human interaction to allow for the open exchange of ideas. By increasing openness, the U.S. has a better chance of protecting its interests in freedom and democracy.
