Manuel E. Yepe 239
The Contradictions of the U.S. Left
The Contradictions of the U.S. Left
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
The dream of creating a super-majority left-wing party in the United States from the ashes of the old Democratic party could be achieved overnight if Senator Bernie Sanders stopped working against the generation of young people who energized his campaign in the United States. confrontation with Hillary Clinton.
That is the idea put forth by the American writer, professor and political activist Gail McGowan Mellor in an article by her published on Huffington Post on September 27.
It is estimated that two-thirds of voters in the US are opposed to the endless wars waged by their country, the granting of subsidies to large corporations and corruption. They want to support environment, public safety, science and social justice. If they were able to unite, they would roll in any suffrage.
At present, there are those who work for the creation of a new great party of the left. They do not do it with a retail approach, because those who have this commitment are 60% of the total number of voters and 78% of the independents, says Mellor.
But several times in the last year the projected new self-organized progressive party has been close to becoming viable and has been blocked by Sanders, who has prioritized the unification and cleansing of the deeply divided and corrupt Democratic party, to which he himself does not belong.
US Senator Bernie Sanders was a 2016 presidential candidate promoted by progressive democrats from the Democratic Party. They were determined to clean up US policy, get out of its endless wars, restore security networks and fight climate change. But they had not found, at the federal level of the two establishment parties, someone who did not receive money from large corporations.
Bernie was an independent politician (without a party) who, 42 years ago, had held local and federal political positions without receiving partisan support or corporate money. A convincing politician, well-informed and passionate, but unknown at the national level, he was raised to the political limelight and to victory by young people between 18 and 50 years of age, known as the millenials). They average 37 years of age and aim at making changes in culture and politics, without imperialist aims and in favor of a democratic reconstruction of society.
At various times, Sanders rejected calls from many of the “millennials”, that he should leave the Democratic trusteeship and create a new party. But, instead of setting this as a goal, Sanders insisted that he could restore the Democratic Party to its old party party glory.
Without military in the divided and corrupt Democratic party, whose supporters barely represent 28% of the registered electorate, Sanders decided to work to achieve the reunification of it. To this end, he called on his supporters to register as Democrats, to the detriment of the progressive ranks that had promoted him and that, for that reason, would be divided and weakened.
The Democrats had accepted him as their presidential primary candidate because it gave them a competitive image that legitimized Hillary Clinton, their pre-determined candidate. The Democratic leadership calculated that beating Bernie would be an easy task for her. In fact, thanks to the millennial generation, Bernie demonstrated, from the first month of the campaign, that in a few hours he could gather an enthusiastic crowd in any city, something that Hillary could not do despite the abundant corporate money she had.
But neither Sanders nor his supporters knew that the Democratic primaries, with their fabulous public expenditures, are always fraudulent and their outcome is predetermined behind closed doors. And the most serious thing is that the party sees this as its right.
At various times, Sanders rejected the idea of many in the millennial generation, of getting out of the Democratic trusteeship and creating a new left party. Not a few of them thought they’d been cheated by the Democratic Party, and betrayed by Sanders. The rigged Democratic primaries ended in June 2016 with the designation of Hillary as party candidate.
Polls showed that Clinton and Trump were then neck-and-neck, four months before the November vote.
Subsequent polls have shown that in the 2016 elections, Sanders would have swept Trump. One of them suggested that Sanders would have obtained 56% of the vote, “an avalanche.”
As an aspiring Democratic presidential candidate, Sanders told TIME magazine that what he was waging was not an election campaign but a “movement leading to a revolution for which he was trying to create political awareness.”
October 23, 2017.
Poor Puerto Rico
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Poor Puerto Rico
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Sad is the situation that Puerto Ricans are going through. The island was recently devastated by a deadly hurricane that crossed its entire length. Hovering over it, sharpened vehemence, is another phenomenon, one more criminal, prolonged and bloody. its condition of being a colony of the United States..
The Federal Agency for Emergency Management (FEMA) has bureaucratically hindered the distribution of aid that has been able to reach Puerto Rico. There are reports that claim that most of the aid for the disaster is still on the docks of San Juan, the capital.
Fifty percent of the population still lacks access to drinking water. The power grid is so damaged that 85 percent of the population still does not have electricity. The lack of fuel and energy hinders the functioning of hospitals and puts at risk the lives of the most vulnerable: children and the elderly. The death rate is increasing, especially in rural areas.
In the midst of the greatest devastation on the island, due to the passage of Hurricane Maria, Puerto Ricans were severely offended when President Trump blamed them for the humanitarian crisis the island was facing.
“Texas and Florida are doing very well, but Puerto Rico, which already suffered from a damaged infrastructure and massive debt, is in trouble,” Trump wrote in his Internet account, comparing the rapid recovery of two of the nation’s major states hit by hurricanes. In the process of degradation that affected them, with the tragedy suffered by their country in the Caribbean because of the most violent hurricane in Borinquen history, with sustained winds of 155 mph (250 km/h).
Trump’s angry reaction to the atrocious humanitarian crisis in Puerto Rico exacerbated by the meteorological phenomenon in the conditions of a country deeply hurt by decades of colonialism and neoliberal policies, has created an explosive situation.
Puerto Rico currently has a debt of $73 billion to its creditors, which is equivalent to the total of its GDP. The commonwealth officially is in default (unable pay the debt). Neither the US government nor the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have presented any solution.
In reality, the country’s debt began to grow in the 1970s. Its economy, since the middle of the last century, was based mainly on the pharmaceutical industry. But with the appearance of the maquiladoras in Mexico and Asia, this sector has been moving to those regions in search of cheaper labor and higher productivity.
Currently, the official unemployment rate in 16 municipalities is 20 percent and in 61 others it exceeds 12 percent, although in reality the real unemployment rate is much higher than the official rate. Some 45 percent of the island’s 3.5 million people live in poverty and 83 percent of children live in poor areas. In a desperate act, last may Governor Rosselló cut the budget by $674 million dollars. This affected the health care system, education, various social programs and the University of Puerto Rico. As a result of the economic crisis, 144,000 Puerto Ricans left the island in search of employment.
Puerto Rico and Cuba have shared destinies as Spanish colonies. Their emancipatory struggles were interrupted by an opportunistic US intervention that sought to adjudge the remnants of the Spanish colonial empire in disgrace. Cuba achieved that the military occupation of the then nascent US imperialism was limited to 4 years and gave way to the proclamation in 1902 of an independent pseudo-republic. January 1959 brought, through the revolution, a genuine independence, although at the cost of a bloody daily battle against American hegemonic appetites.
118 years ago Washington seized Puerto Rico and the other vestiges of the Spanish empire in the Western Hemisphere. When neoliberalism broke onto the scene, to provide an injection of life to capitalism in crisis, the impulse towards the privatization of everything that existed caused extraordinary damage in Puerto Rico. Living conditions deteriorated with the disappearance of government funds for social programs and jobs. The island’s infrastructure was devastated by a campaign to convert everything from roads and public services to the education system into private for-profit companies.
Colonialism imposed an unpayable debt on Puerto Rico. Now it has had a dictatorial junta imposed on it to ensure that this debt is paid, even at the cost of a humanitarian crisis for the Puerto Rican people. Boricuas are demanding, specifically, that this debt be audited and that it be determined which part of it is legitimate and who is responsible for having assumed it.
October 30, 2017
Pobre Puerto Rico
Por Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusivo para el diario POR ESTO! de Mérida, México
Triste es la situación por la que atraviesan los puertorriqueños; recién arrasada su isla por un mortífero huracán que la atravesó por toda su extensión, se cierne sobre ella con agudizada vehemencia otro fenómeno más criminal, prolongado y cruento, su condición colonial respecto a Estados Unidos.
La Agencia Federal para el Manejo de Emergencias (FEMA, según las siglas en inglés) ha obstaculizado burocráticamente la distribución de la ayuda que ha podido llegar a Puerto Rico. Hay reportajes que afirman que la mayor parte de la ayuda para el desastre aún se encuentra en los muelles de San Juan, la capital.
Cincuenta por ciento de la población carece aún de acceso a agua potable y la red eléctrica está tan dañada que el 85 por ciento de la población aún no tiene electricidad. La falta de combustible y energía obstaculiza el funcionamiento de hospitales y pone en riesgo la vida de los más vulnerables: los niños y ancianos. La tasa de mortandad está aumentando sobre todo en áreas rurales.
En medio de la mayor devastación de que se tenga memoria en la isla a causa del paso del huracán María, los puertorriqueños se sintieron duramente ofendidos cuando el presidente Trump les culpó por la crisis humanitaria a la que estaba abocada la isla.
“Texas y Florida van muy bien, pero Puerto Rico, que ya sufría una infraestructura dañada y una deuda masiva, está en problemas”, escribió Trump en su cuenta de Internet comparando la rápida recuperación de dos de los principales estados de la nación ante huracanes en proceso de degradación que les afectaron, con la tragedia sufrida por su colonia en el Caribe a causa del cruce por su territorio del huracán más violento que haya azotado a Borinquen en toda su historia, con vientos sostenidos de 155 m/h (250 km/h).
La reacción iracunda de Trump ante la atroz crisis humanitaria de Puerto Rico agudizada por el fenómeno meteorológico en las condiciones de un país profundamente herido por décadas de colonialismo y políticas neoliberales, ha creado una situación explosiva.
Actualmente Puerto Rico tiene una deuda de 73 mil millones de dólares a sus acreedores, lo que equivale al total de su PIB. El Estado Libre Asociado oficialmente está en default (incapacidad de pagar la deuda) sin que ni el gobierno norteamericano ni el Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI) hayan presentado solución alguna.
En realidad la deuda del país empezó a crecer a partir de los años 1970. Su economía desde la mitad del siglo pasado estaba basada principalmente en la industria farmacéutica pero con la aparición de las maquiladoras en México y en Asia, este sector se ha estado trasladando a aquellas regiones en busca de mano de obra más barata y de mayor productividad.
Actualmente el índice oficial de desempleo en 16 municipios es del 20 por ciento y en otros 61 supera al 12 por ciento, aunque en realidad la tasa real de desempleo es mucho más alta que la oficial. Un 45 por ciento del total de 3,5 millones de habitantes de la isla viven en la pobreza y el 83 por ciento de los niños viven en áreas pobres. En acto desesperado, el gobernador Rosselló recortó en mayo pasado el presupuesto en 674 millones de dólares afectando el sistema de salud, la educación, varios programas sociales y la Universidad de Puerto Rico. Como resultado de la crisis económica 144.000 puertorriqueños abandonaron la isla en busca de empleo.
Puerto Rico y Cuba han compartido destinos como colonias de España cuyas luchas emancipadoras fueron interrumpidas por una oportunista intervención estadounidense que pretendió adjudicarse los remanentes de imperio colonial español en desgracia. Cuba logró que la ocupación militar del entonces naciente imperialismo de Estados Unidos se limitara a 4 años y diera paso a la proclamación en 1902 a una seudorepública independiente que en enero de 1959 trajo, revolución mediante, una independencia verdadera, aunque al costo de librar una cruenta batalla cotidiana contra los apetitos hegemónicos estadounidenses.
Hace 118 años que Washington se apoderó de Puerto Rico y los demás vestigios del imperio español en el hemisferio occidental. Cuando el neoliberalismo irrumpió en la escena para proporcionar una inyección de vida al capitalismo en crisis, el impulso hacia la privatización de todo lo existente causó perjuicios extraordinarios en Puerto Rico. Se deterioraron las condiciones de vida al desaparecer los fondos gubernamentales para fines sociales y los empleos. La infraestructura de la isla quedó devastada por una campaña para convertirlo todo, desde las carreteras y los servicios públicos hasta el sistema educativo, en empresas privadas con fines de lucro.
El coloniaje impuso a Puerto Rico una deuda impagable y ahora le ha impuesto una junta dictatorial para asegurar que se pague esa deuda, aunque sea al costo de una crisis humanitaria para el pueblo puertorriqueño. Los boricuas reclaman, justamente, que se audite esa deuda y se determine qué parte de la misma es legítima y quiénes son los respons
A Tale of Deaf and Unmentionable Spies
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- Español
A Tale of Deaf and Unmentionable Spies
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
It appears that a new maneuver against Cuba by terrorist sectors in the US government’s foreign policy establishment has been exposed and neutralized when the Associated Press (AP) published information dated September 15, 2017 about damages caused by Hurricane Irma and the penetration of the sea that affected the building that houses the US Embassy in Havana.
According to the AP, a National Security Subcommittee (NSSC) official, who asked not to be identified, revealed to his correspondents that the NSSC was filing a lawsuit against the American Technology Corporation (ATC), maker of the LRAD equipment -RX that the NSSC uses to communicate with its agents in Cuba.
The suit was based on the auditory harm that these equipment would have caused to workers of the NSSC, its officials and relatives. According to the plaintiff, the equipment in question was purchased less than a year earlier and the ATC experts who trained those who would be responsible for using them at any time warned them against hearing problems.
Anonymous sources had then told the AP that the hearing loss may have been related to sound devices that emit inaudible waves capable of causing deafness.
According to the source, the suit presented by the NSSC included economic compensation for damages caused to workers of the teams and their relatives, as well as for operational damages suffered by the NSSC.
Immediately the NSSC knew of the auditory problems caused to the operators, it ordered discontinuance of use of the LRAD-RX but this implied an immediate change in the means of communication with its agents, which entailed higher expenses that surpassed what which is budgeted.
However, in May 2017, the State Department ordered the expulsion of two Cuban diplomats in response to “incidents” at the US embassy in Cuba without specifying what or whom they considered guilty.
The penetration of the sea in the embassy due to a hurricane. It complicated the investigation into the technological aspects of the case. This was because part of the equipment was under the sea. Although the trip to Cuba by a number of technicians and specialists was supposed to verify the condition of the equipment, this aspect of the research did not make sense. Public and staff access to the Embassy was restricted in order to disassemble the equipment and send it to the United States for eventual repairs by the manufacturers without the knowledge of the result.
It is alleged that, although the ATC is a commercially-registered US firm, it is an entity created by the security forces of the state of Israel and, as has been reported, LRAD is a weapon that emits a sound that temporarily deafens the adversary. From what we’ve seen so far, it is clear that the maneuver was intended to involve Cuba in an act of terrorism, a scourge in which the island has never dirtied its flag, although it has been a constant a victim of it.
However, when suspicions seemed to focus on supplier-related technological problems, US Sen. Marco Rubio made scandalous statements “calling for blood against Cuba”. This showed Florida’s Republican politician as likely axis of terrorist manipulation.
Shortly afterwards, Washington withdrew 60% of the staff from its embassy in Havana, and then expelled 15 diplomats from the Cuban embassy in the United States. The US argued that “there are no adequate Cuban measures to protect our diplomats from sonic attacks”. This is despite the fact that, from the outset, Cuba said that it would do everything possible to investigate the facts and invited the FBI to join the investigation in Cuba.
This investigation by Cuban authorities involved some 2000 people, including law enforcement officials and the best scientists in the country. They interviewed 300 neighbors and carried out dozens of medical examinations to see if anyone outside the diplomatic cadre had been affected.
They examined the rooms of two hotels where several employees of the United States Embassy lived, interviewed 300 neighbors in a neighborhood where many lived in houses. They analyzed air and soil samples, verified whether insects could be the culprits and considered a range of toxic chemicals and even electromagnetic waves.
However, the United States has refused to allow Cuban doctors access to the medical records of those affected or to let Cubans talk to US doctors. Neither were Cuban experts allowed to visit the homes of the US diplomats involved to conduct expert tests.
October 28, 2017
Un cuento de espías sordos e innombrables
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Parecía que una nueva maniobra contra Cuba de los sectores terroristas en la política exterior del gobierno estadounidense había sido expuesta y neutralizada cuando la agencia Associated Press (AP) publicó una información fechada el 15 de septiembre de 2017 acerca de los daños ocasionados por el ciclón Irma y la penetración del mar que afectó el edificio que alberga a la Embajada de Estados Unidos en La Habana.
Según la AP, un funcionario del Subcomité Nacional de Seguridad (NSSC, por sus siglas en inglés) que pidió no ser identificado, reveló a sus corresponsales que el NSSC preparaba una demanda contra la American Technology Corporation (ATC), fabricante de los equipos LRAD-RX que utiliza el NSSC para comunicarse con sus agentes en Cuba.
La demanda se fundamentaba en la afectación auditiva que dichos equipos habrían causado a operarios del NSSC, sus funcionarios y familiares. Según el demandante, los equipos en cuestión fueron adquiridos menos de un año antes y los expertos de la ATC que entrenaron a quienes se encargarían de utilizaros en ningún momento les advirtieron contra problemas auditivos.
Fuentes anónimas habían dicho entonces a la agencia AP que la pérdida auditiva pudo estar relacionada con dispositivos de sonido que emiten ondas inaudibles capaces de causar sordera.
Según la fuente, la demanda que presentaría el NSSC incluía compensación económica por los daños ocasionados a operarios de los equipos y los familiares de éstos afectados, así como por los perjuicios operativos sufridos por el NSSC.
Inmediatamente que el NSSC conoció de los problemas auditivos ocasionados a los operadores, ordenó descontinuar la utilización del LRAD-RX pero esto implicó un cambio inmediato en los medios de comunicación con sus agentes, lo cual conllevó mayores gastos que sobrepasaban lo presupuestado.
Sin embargo, en mayo de 2017, que el Departamento de Estado dispuso la expulsión de dos diplomáticos cubanos en respuesta a “incidentes” ocurridos en su embajada en Cuba sin precisar a qué o quién consideraba culpable.
La penetración del mar en la Embajada a causa de un huracán complicó la investigación acerca de los aspectos tecnológicos del caso porque una parte del equipamiento quedó bajo las aguas del mar y aunque se había planificado el viaje a Cuba de un número de técnicos y especialistas para verificar las condiciones de los equipos, ya este aspecto de la pesquisa no tenía sentido. Sólo se limitó el acceso de público y del personal a la Embajada a fin de desmontar los equipos y enviarlos a Estados Unidos para su eventual revisión por los fabricantes sin que se sepa del resultado.
Se afirma que, aunque la ATC es una firma estadounidense por su registro comercial, se trata de una entidad creada por las fuerzas de seguridad del Estado de Israel y, según se ha publicado, la LRAD es un arma que emite un sonido que deja temporalmente sordo al adversario. Por los elementos evidenciados hasta el momento es claro que la maniobra tenía el propósito de involucrar a Cuba en un acto de terrorismo, flagelo en el que la Isla jamás ha ensuciado su bandera aunque ha sido constantemente víctima de éste.
Sin embargo, cuando las sospechas parecían concentrarse en problemas tecnológicos imputables al suministrador, escandalosas declaraciones del senador estadounidense Marco Rubio “pidiendo sangre contra Cuba” evidenciaron al político republicano de Florida como probable eje de la manipulación terrorista.
Poco después Washington retiró el 60 % de los trabajadores de su Embajada en La Habana y luego expulsó 15 diplomáticos de la misión cubana en Estados Unidos arguyendo la “inexistencia de medidas cubanas adecuadas para proteger a nuestros diplomáticos de los ataques sónicos” pasando por alto el hecho de que, desde el primer momento, Cuba dijo que haría todo lo posible por indagar los hechos y había invitado al FBI a compartir las pesquisas en Cuba.
Unas 2.000 personas involucraron las autoridades cubanas en esta investigación, incluyendo agentes de orden público y los mejores científicos del país. Entrevistaron a 300 vecinos y llevaron a cabo decenas de exámenes médicos para ver si alguien fuera del cuadro diplomático había sido afectado.
Examinaron las habitaciones de dos hoteles donde vivían varios empleados de la Embajada de Estados Unidos, entrevistaron a 300 vecinos en un barrio donde muchos vivían casas. Analizaron muestras de aire y el suelo, verificaron sí podrían ser insectos los culpables y consideraron una gama de productos químicos tóxicos e incluso de ondas electromagnéticas.
Sin embargo, Estados Unidos se ha negado a permitir a los médicos cubanos acceso a las historias clínicas de los afectados o a dejar que los cubanos hablen con los médicos de Estados Unidos. Tampoco se permitió a los peritos cubanos visitar los hogares de los diplomáticos estadounidenses implicados para llevar a cabo pruebas periciales.
Octubre 28 de 2017
Fifty Years Since the October Missile Crisis
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Fifty Years Since the October Missile Crisis
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico
Translated and edited for CubaNews by Walter Lippmann.
For the average American citizen, and most of humanity subjected to the US media dictatorship, the origin of the Missile Crisis in October 1962 is that the Soviet Union decided to place missiles with atomic warheads in Cuba to threaten U.S.
But in order to understand the reason for the October Crisis, it is necessary to assess its antecedents. This is because, in the different versions of the circumstances one can understand the real reasons for the presence of the missiles in Cuba and, without that, it is not possible to understand the crisis itself.
It was the continued aggression of the United States against the island and the dangers that these actions foreshadowed because of Kennedy’s conviction that Cuba had to be charged on a large scale by the defeat of Playa Giron, where the extreme cause of tensions between the two countries.
The leadership of the Cuban revolution accepted the installation of the rockets as a measure to make Washington relinquish its plans for extreme violence against Cuba. They were convinced that in doing so they complied with a principle of internationalist solidarity with the socialist camp and, in particular, with the USSR.
On October 16, 1962, Washington drew up plans to militarily occupy Cuba and establish an interim government led by a “military commander and governor” of the United States during the 1962 missile crisis, according to recently declassified government documents issued one week by the National Security Archive (NSA) of George Washington University.
Proclamation number one of the Military Government that would have been constituted would establish that “every person who is in the occupied territory must obey immediately and without questions all the laws and orders promulgated by the military government”. He warned that “resistance to the United States Armed Forces will be punished with force. Offenders will be treated severely. ” He said, however, that “those who remain peaceful and fulfill all the orders of the military command, will be subjected to a repression no greater that prescribed by the military exigencies”.
The proclamation stated that “once Castro’s aggressive regime is completely destroyed” and Washington has installed a new government “that responds to the needs of the people of Cuba”, US forces “will withdraw and the traditional friendship of the United States and the government of Cuba will be assured once again. “
Cuban and American historians are preparing a book to be published by Editorial GEO, from the Cuban History Institute, with abundant original documents and maps. It’s edited by American journalists William Burr and Peter Kornbluh, who provide abundant information about that event which put the world on the brink of a third world war.
To prepare the Cuban population for the invasion, the US military planned to launch thousands of leaflets on Cuban cities and fields. Initially the leaflets would report that “the US military has temporarily taken over their country.” Then they would warn the population that “they should stay inside their houses” because “everything that moves will be considered a target of our bullets.”
On 28 October, final preparations for the US invasion and occupation of Cuba were halted when Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev announced that he was withdrawing the missiles from the island. That decision was, according to US media sources, the result of a secret agreement, under which the Soviet missiles in Cuba would be withdrawn in exchange for President Kennedy’s commitment to remove US Jupiter missiles from Turkey.
“The settlement of the missile crisis certainly avoided what would have become the bloodiest military confrontation in Latin American history, between the ‘Northern Colossus’ and a revolutionary Caribbean nation,” according to Peter Kornbluh, who heads the Cuba documentation project at the National Security Archives.
Ignored by the US intelligence community, according to Kornbluh, was the fact that, “in addition to intercontinental ballistic missiles, the Soviets had transported tactical field nuclear weapons to Cuba and planned to deploy them against an invading US force.”
Documents related to the Cuban occupation were recently obtained by the NSA-accredited archival analyst, William Burr, by formulating a series of petitions to the United States Navy, as established for the Re-declassification Requests Mandatory (MDR).
October 20, 2017.
A 55 AÑOS DE LA CRISIS DE MISILES EN OCTUBRE
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Para el ciudadano estadounidense medio y la mayor parte de la humanidad sometida a la dictadura mediática de Estados Unidos, el origen de la Crisis de los Cohetes en octubre de 1962 está en que la Unión Soviética decidió situar misiles con cargas atómicas en Cuba para amenazar a Estados Unidos.
Pero para comprender la razón de la Crisis de Octubre hay que valorar los antecedentes de ésta, porque en las diferentes versiones de las partes acerca de las circunstancias es en lo que se aprecian las verdaderas razones que provocaron la presencia de los mísiles en Cuba y, sin ello, no es posible entender la crisis misma.
Fueron las agresiones continuadas de Estados Unidos contra la isla y en los peligros que estas acciones presagiaban a causa de la convicción que tenía Kennedy de que debía cobrarse, invadiendo a Cuba en gran escala, la derrota de Playa Girón, donde se aprecia la causa extrema de las tensiones entre ambos países.
La dirección de la revolución cubana aceptó la instalación de los cohetes como medida para hacer desistir a Washington de sus planes de violencia extrema contra Cuba, convencida de que con ello cumplía con un principio de solidaridad internacionalista con el campo socialista y, en particular, con la URSS.
El 16 de octubre de 1962, Washington elaboró planes para ocupar militarmente a Cuba y establecer un gobierno provisional encabezado por un “comandante y gobernador militar” de Estados Unidos durante la crisis de los misiles de 1962, según documentos gubernamentales recientemente desclasificados, publicados hace una semana por el Archivo de Seguridad Nacional (NSA) de la Universidad George Washington.
La Proclama número uno del Gobierno Militar que se habría de constituir establecería que “toda persona que se encuentre en el territorio ocupado debe obedecer de inmediato y sin preguntas todas las leyes y órdenes promulgadas por el gobierno militar”. Prevenía que “la resistencia a las Fuerzas Armadas de Estados Unidos será castigada con fuerza. Los infractores serán tratados severamente”. Afirmaba, sin embargo que “quienes se mantengan pacíficos y cumplan todas las órdenes del mando militar, serán objetos a una represión no mayor que la prescrita por las exigencias militares”.
La Proclama establecía que “una vez que el régimen agresivo de Castro sea completamente destruido” y que Washington haya instalado un nuevo gobierno “que responda a las necesidades del pueblo de Cuba” las fuerzas estadounidenses “se retirarán y la amistad tradicional de Estados Unidos y el gobierno de Cuba será asegurada una vez más”.
Historiadores cubanos y estadounidenses preparan un libro que publicará la Editorial GEO, del Instituto de Historia de Cuba, con abundantes documentos originales y mapas, editado por los periodistas estadounidenses William Burr y Peter Kornbluh, que aporta abundante información acerca de este acontecimiento que puso al mundo al borde de una tercera guerra mundial.
Para preparar a la población cubana para la invasión, el ejército estadounidense planeaba lanzar miles de folletos sobre ciudades y campos cubanos. Inicialmente los folletos informarían que “las fuerzas armadas de Estados Unidos se han hecho cargo temporal de su país”. Luego advertirían a la población que “debe permanecer en sus casas” porque “todo lo que se mueva será considerado un blanco de nuestras balas”.
El 28 de octubre se interrumpieron los preparativos finales para la invasión de estadounidense y la ocupación de Cuba, cuando el líder soviético Nikita Jruschov anunció que estaba retirando los misiles de la isla. Tal decisión fue, según fuentes mediáticas de Estados Unidos, resultado de un acuerdo secreto, en virtud del cual serían retirados los misiles soviéticos de Cuba a cambio del compromiso del Presidente Kennedy de sacar de Turquía los misiles Júpiter estadounidenses dislocados allí.
“La solución de la crisis de los misiles evitó ciertamente lo que se habría convertido en el enfrentamiento militar más sangriento en la historia de América Latina, entre el ‘Coloso del norte’ y una nación caribeña revolucionaria” según Peter Kornbluh, quien dirige el Proyecto de documentación sobre Cuba del NSA.
Ignorado por la comunidad de inteligencia de Estados Unidos, según Kornbluh, quedó el hecho de que, “además de los misiles balísticos intercontinentales, los soviéticos habían transportado a Cuba armas nucleares tácticas de campo y planeaban desplegar contra una fuerza invasora de Estados Unidos”.
Los documentos relacionados con la ocupación de Cuba fueron obtenidos recientemente por el analista de archivo acreditado ante el NSA, William Burr, mediante la formulación de una serie de peticiones a la Marina de Estados Unidos, según lo establecido para las solicitudes de Revisión para la Desclasificación Obligatoria (MDR).
Octubre 20 de 2017.
Origins of the Cuban-American Mafia
- English
- Español
Origins of the Cuban-American Mafia of Miami
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann for CubaNews.
Miami, Florida, is considered in political circles around the world as the home of the worst of the Cuban community in North America. As a safe haven for some of the most dangerous terrorists in the country and the world, in that country’s plight, they have established many garrison headquarters that control illicit businesses related to arms, drugs and human trafficking.
But it has not always been this way. The story was told by Mario Puzo in his Godfather books and films about the violent methods used by the first Italian mafia groups of immigrants, who changed their ways to adapt to the American Way of Life. This even reached the level of the high politics of the United States, and can be compared with the history of the Cuban mafia of South Florida.
In 1959, hundreds of corrupt politicians and servants of the defeated Batista tyranny began to arrive in Miami with bags stuffed with dollars stolen from Cuba’s public treasury. There were hundreds of torturers and murderers among them. They were organized and re-organized by the CIA and other agencies of the United States government to be used in military and terrorist acts against the Cuban revolution and other misdeeds of the extreme right-US in the world.
These fearsome “refugees” were the germ of what came to be the powerful Cuban-American mafia in Miami when they joined other elements of the subsequent Cuban emigration.
Meanwhile, the American extreme right, using its intelligence and subversion organizations, organized various terrorist groups of Cubans. They were recruited from among the emigres and on the island. Their goal was subverting order in Cuba and creating the conditions for military invasion and re-occupation of the island.
After the roaring failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion in the Bay of Pigs, the American extreme right intensified hundreds of other terrorist projects that also went down to defeat.
They then opted for a tactical change that gradually turned the cleverly-made Cuban terrorists into politicians who controlled US foreign policy toward Cuba for almost half a century and through the administration of twelve different US presidents.
The process of legitimizing the representatives of Cuban-American mafia in the political establishment of the United States was fast and effective. They learned the game of politicking, opportunism, and fraud. Soon they had several members of congress, senior executive officials and ambassadors, as well as a number of members of the judicial power in Florida. They incorporated to this learning their methods acquired during the bloody dictatorship of Batista in Cuba.
Some of these groups have been imposing since 1959 methods of depression comparable to those of the Chicago gangsters in the 30s or 40s of last century to manipulate the population of Cuban immigrants in the United States.
The Cuban-American mafia of South Florida has carried out numerous terrorist acts. They have participated in political crimes funded by the extreme right US policy as much in Cuba as ub the United States as well as in other countries in Latin America and Europe.
They have been involved in electoral tricks and political scandals involving Latin American countries, and in the United States as well. They know the protagonists of Watergate and the electoral fraud in Florida that presided over George W. Bush in 2000. It is known that they were involved in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
It was not that they were politicians and officials of Cuban origin, but not only that. They were “Cuban-Americans” clearly aligned with the extreme right of the country, recently unmarked from the ranks of known terrorist elements with links to Miami.
There have been attempts to get Cuban-Americans to lead Latinos in the political establishment, but the interests and ambitions of both groups have been incompatible.
Cuban-American politicians, with honorable exceptions, are a more homogenous and manageable group than other Latino immigrants because, as a rule, they respond uniformly to the interests of those who promote them, because they are something like laboratory politicians, cloned and breastfed by the conservative forces to which their promotions owe.
However, at present, we must take into account that three-quarters of the Cubans who emigrated to the United States. After 1980, they did so for economic reasons. Because of this, they are carriers of many of the ethical, moral and patriotic values of the revolution. Sooner or later they will end up imposing coexistence with Havana, making the business of the counterrevolution, with which the Cuban-American mafia made its fortune, obsolete.
October 13, 2017.
LOS ORÍGENES DE LA MAFIA CUBANA DE MIAMI
By Manuel E. Yepe
Exclusivo para el diario POR ESTO! de Mérida, México.
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
La ciudad estadounidense de Miami, en el estado de Florida, es reputada en medios políticos de todo el mundo como sede de lo peor de la comunidad cubana en Norteamérica. Como santuario seguro para algunos de los terroristas más peligrosos del país y el mundo, en esepedazo de la nación norteña, han radicado muchas jefaturas depandillas que controlan negocios ilícitos relacionados con el contrabando de armas, drogas y seres humanos.
Pero esto no siempre ha sido así. La historia que relata Mario Puzo en sus libros y filmes acerca de los métodos violentos de las primeras familias mafiosas italianas de inmigrantes que fueron modificando sus procederes para adaptarse a la American Way of Life, incluso al nivel de la alta política de Estados Unidos, se puede comparar con la historia de la mafia cubana del Sur de la Florida.
Cuando en 1959 comenzaron a llegar a Miami centenares de corruptos políticos y servidores de la derrotada tiranía de Batista con sus maletas cargadas de dólares robados al tesoro público cubano, iban con ellos cientos de policías torturadores y asesinos. Ellos fueron reclutados y organizados por la CIA y otras agencias del gobierno de Estados Unidos para ser utilizados en actos militares y terroristas contra la revolución cubana y en otras fechorías de la extrema derecha estadounidense en el mundo.
Estos temibles “refugiados” constituyeron el germen de lo que llegó aser la poderosa mafia cubana de Miami cuando a ellos se unieron otrosfactores de la posterior emigración cubana.
Entretanto, la extrema derecha estadounidense, valiéndose de susorganizaciones de inteligencia y subversión organizaba diversos gruposterroristas de cubanos reclutados en la emigración y en la isla con elpropósito de subvertir el orden en Cuba y crear las condiciones para ainvasión militar y ocupación de la isla.
Tras el estruendoso fracaso de la invasión de Playa Girón en la Bahía de Cochinos, la extrema derecha estadounidense intensificó cientos de otros proyectos terroristas que también naufragaron.
Optaron entonces por un cambio táctico que gradualmente convirtió alos terroristas cubanos, hábilmente maquillados, en políticos quellegaron a controlar la política exterior de Estados Unidos respecto a Cuba durante casi medio siglo y la administración de doce presidentesdistintos. El proceso de legitimación de los representantes de lamafia cubana en el establishment político de Estados Unidos fue rápidoy efectivo.
Aprendieron el juego de la politiquería, el oportunismo,los fraudes y pronto tuvieron varios congresistas, altos funcionarios del poder ejecutivo y embajadores, así como un número de miembros delpoder judicial en la Florida. Incorporaron a este aprendizaje susexperiencias metodológicas adquiridas durante la cruenta dictadura de Batista en Cuba.
Una parte de esos grupos fueron imponiendo desde 1959 métodos depresión comparables con los de los gangsters de Chicago en los años 30o 40 del pasado siglo para manipular a la población de inmigrantes cubanos en Estados Unidos.
La mafia cubana del Sur de la Florida, ha realizado numerosos actos terroristas y ha participado en crímenes políticos financiados por la extrema derecha política estadounidense tanto en Cuba y Estados Unidos como en otros países de América Latina y Europa.
Han intervenido en trampas electorales y escándalos políticos en varios países latinoamericanos y, en los propios Estados Unidos, seles sabe protagonistas de los hechos de Watergate y del fraudecomicial en Florida que dio la presidencia a George W. Bush en el año2000. Se sabe que estuvieron involucrados en el asesinato delpresidente John F. Kennedy.
No es que fueran políticos y funcionarios de origen cubano, no son sólo eso. Eran “cubanoamericanos” claramente alineados con la extrema derecha del país, recién desmarcados de las filas de connotados elementos terroristas con referentes en Miami.
Ha habido intentos por hacer que los cubanoamericanos lideren a loshispanos en el establishment político pero los intereses y ambiciones de ambos grupos se han mostrado incompatibles.
Los políticos cubanoamericanos, con honrosas excepciones, resultan un grupo más homogéneo y manejable que los de otros inmigrantes hispanos porque, como regla, responden de manera uniforme en su actuación a los intereses de quienes los promueven, porque son algo así como políticos de laboratorio, clonados y amamantados por las fuerzas neoconservadoras a las que deben sus ascensos.
Sin embargo, en la actualidad, hay que tener en cuenta que trescuartas partes de los cubanos que emigraron a EE.UU. después de 1980lo hicieron por motivos económicos. Por ello, son portadores de muchos valores éticos, morales y patrióticos de la revolución y acabarán porimponer, más temprano que tarde, la coexistencia con La Habanahaciendo obsoleto el negocio de la contrarrevolución con que la mafia cubana hizo su fortuna.
Octubre 13 de 2017.
Chávez was to Bolívar as Fidel was to Martí
- English
- Español
Chávez was to Bolívar as Fidel was to Martí
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
https://walterlippmann.com/chavez-was-to-bolivar-as-fidel-was-to-marti/
Distant in time but so similar in their ideas that the dates cannot separate their lives, Bolívar and Martí were born, as if by history’s mandate, to serve the noblest ideals of the emancipation of Latin America. Three–quarters of a century after Simón Bolívar’s death, Jose Marti warned that what the Liberator had not been able to do was yet to be done, and so he dedicated his enormous talent to it and gave his life for it.
Cuba’s national hero soon realized that America was not what the great Venezuelan had dreamed of. He knew that the misery and inequality of the continent stemmed from the unjust administration of the freedom that the great Bolívar had won for America.
Bolívar and Martí dreamed, each in his time, of the impregnable union and integration of the peoples that had won independence from Spain. The Gran Colombia unveiled to Bolívar as much as to Martí the idea of uprooting from the Cubans the divisions that had ruined the 10–year War “in order to avoid, through the independence of Cuba, that the United States would fall, with full force, on the peoples of our America.” Martí founded the Cuban Revolutionary Party to correct that evil, which would, like a merger of wills lead to Cuban independence from Spain. That is why he remembered Bolívar when he repeatedly spoke in his effort to add consciousness and arms to the will for independence.
Thanks to the unity that Martí had forged in the revolutionary ranks, when the United States –without being called upon by the Cubans to do so– intervened in Cuba’s war for independence. A Cuban victory was near and inevitable, the patriotic sentiments in the island were too strong to be ignored. The seed of Martí’s patriotism had germinated and its fruitfulness could not be frustrated by converting Cuba into a colony, not even by means of pseudo-independence.
In his longing for freedom, for a Cuba that was still enslaved, Martí remembered Bolívar, more than half a century after his death, as “a truly extraordinary man”. Martí wondered, for himself and his audience, what place the Liberator would hold in Hispanic American history.
Almost a century after Marti’s founding of the Cuban Revolutionary Party, and almost two years after the birth of the Liberator, in 1982, Venezuelan captain Hugo Chávez endorsed the words of the Cuban apostle when he said “Bolívar still has something to do in America”, referring to Bolívar ‘s unfinished work on the continent.
“Because what Bolívar did not do, remains without being done today,” emphasized captain Hugo Chávez. And he went on: “But there sits Bolívar , watchful and frowning, on the rock of creation in the sky of America, with the Inca beside him, and the bundle of flags at his feet. There he is, still wearing his campaign boots… “
Where will Bolívar go?, Martí had asked many decades before. And the answer seems to have been heard clearly by the young and idealistic Captain Hugo Chávez: “Arm in arm with men, to defend the land where humanity will be most blessed and beautiful, from the new greed and the stubborn old spirit!”
On the 109th anniversary of José Martí’s death in combat, on May 19, 2004, Hugo Chávez, then president of Venezuela, recalled the decision that accompanied the Cuban hero “building the homeland that was stolen and denied to us many times”.
Chávez, while imprisoned in the barracks in Venezuela, was able to read Martí, and the imprint of the Cuban leader was marked in his soul. He showed the imprint that the Cuban apostle left on him when he acknowledged in him, “a value bordering on audacity, temerity and glory. Martí had never fought in wars, arms in hand, but it was he who armed the Revolution, traveled the Caribbean, even the United States, seeking support. He brought together ideas and logistics, united the different trends that existed in Cuba; but, as he had not fought until then, he wanted to go to fight … “.
And fighting, he gave his life to his homeland, not without first confessing –in an unfinished letter to his Mexican friend Manuel Mercado– that all that he had done in his life with his life was to prevent, with Cuba’s independence, that the United States fell, with all its great force on the nations of “our America”.
On July 26, 1953, Fidel Castro credited Marti, with the merit of having conceived, organized and directed the assault on the Moncada Barracks. This opened the revolutionary process that led to today’s Cuban reality. Similarly, the call to the Bolívar ian Revolutionary Movement, coming from the hand and mind of Hugo Chávez, brought a new hope for Latin America which has always recognized Bolívar as its true promoter.
September 28, 2017.
CHÁVEZ ES A BOLIVAR LO QUE FIDEL A MARTÍ
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusivo para el diario POR ESTO! de Mérida, México.
Distantes en el tiempo pero tan semejantes en sus ideas que las fechas no pueden separar sus vidas, Bolívar y Martí nacieron, como por mandato de la historia, para servir a los más nobles ideales de la emancipación de América Latina. Tres cuartos de siglo después de la muerte de Simón Bolívar, José Martí advirtió que lo que no había podido hacer el Libertador estaba aún por hacerse, dedicó a ello su enorme talento y entregó su vida a esa causa.
Supo prontamente el héroe nacional cubano que América no era lo que el gran venezolano había soñado. Sabía que la miseria y la desigualdad del continente derivaban de la injusta administración de la libertad que para América había ganado el inmenso Bolívar.
Bolívar y Martí soñaron, cada uno en su momento, con la unión inexpugnable y la integración de los pueblos independizados de España. La Gran Colombia desveló a Bolívar tanto como a Martí la idea de arrancar de los cubanos las divisiones que habían echado por tierra la Guerra de los 10 años “para evitar con la independencia de Cuba que Estados Unidos cayera, con esa fuerza más, sobre los pueblos de nuestra América”. Martí fundó para corregir ese mal el Partido Revolucionario Cubano como aglutinador de voluntades que conducirían a materializar la independencia cubana de España. Por eso recordaba a Bolívar cuando hablaba sin descanso para sumar conciencias y brazos a la voluntad independentista.
Gracias a la unidad que forjó Martí en las filas revolucionarias, cuando Estados Unidos intervino -sin ser llamado por los cubanos a hacerlo- en la guerra cubana por la independencia y ya era próxima e inevitable una victoria cubana, los sentimientos patrióticos en la isla eran demasiado fuertes como para ser ignorados. La semilla del patriotismo martiano había germinado y su fructificación no pudo frustrarse con la conversión de Cuba en una colonia, ni siquiera con el invento de la seudoindependencia.
En su sueño anhelante de libertad para una Cuba que todavía era esclava, Martí evocaba a Bolívar, a más de medio siglo de su muerte, como “un hombre verdaderamente extraordinario” y se preguntaba, para sí y para sus auditorios, qué sitio ocuparía el Libertador en la historia hispanoamericana.
Casi un siglo luego de la fundación por José Martí del Partido Revolucionario Cubano, y a casi dos del natalicio del Libertador, en 1982, el capitán venezolano Hugo Chávez hizo suyas las palabras del Apóstol cubano al referir que “Bolívar tiene qué hacer en América todavía”, refiriéndose a la obra inacabada de Bolívar en el continente.
“Porque lo que Bolívar no dejó hecho, sin hacer está hoy”, enfatizó el capitán Hugo Chávez. Y siguió: “Pero así está Bolívar, vigilante y ceñudo, en el cielo de América, sentado aún en la roca de crear, con el inca al lado y el haz de banderas a los pies; así está él, calzadas aún las botas de campaña…”.
¿A dónde irá Bolívar?, había preguntado Martí muchas décadas antes. Y la respuesta parece haberla oído claramente el joven e idealista capitán Hugo Chavez: “¡Al brazo de los hombres, para que defiendan de la nueva codicia y del terco espíritu viejo la tierra donde será más dichosa y bella la humanidad!”
En el aniversario 109 de la caída en combate de José Martí, el 19 de mayo de 2004, Hugo Chávez, ya presidente de Venezuela, recordaba la decisión que acompañaba al héroe de la isla antillana de “construir la Patria que nos robaron y nos negaron tantas veces”.
Chávez, quien preso en los cuarteles de Venezuela, pudo leer a Martí, sembró en su alma la huella del líder cubano. Daba fe de la impronta que el Apóstol cubano dejó en él al reconocerle, “un valor rayano en la audacia, en la temeridad y en la gloria. Martí no había combatido nunca en guerras, con armas en la mano, pero fue quien armó la Revolución, viajó por el Caribe, incluso por Estados Unidos, buscando apoyo. Armó las ideas y la logística, produjo la unión de las distintas corrientes que había en Cuba, pero como él no había combatido hasta entonces, quiso ir a combatir…”.
Y combatiendo entregó su vida a su Patria, no sin antes confesar, en carta inconclusa a su amigo mexicano Manuel Mercado, que todo cuanto en silencio había tenido que hacer en su vida era por evitar con la independencia para Cuba, que los Estados Unidos cayeran, con esa fuerza más sobre las naciones de “nuestra América”.
Así como el 26 de Julio de 1953 Fidel Castro cedió a Martí el mérito de haber concebido, organizado y dirigido el asalto al Cuartel Moncada que dio inicio al proceso revolucionario que condujo a la realidad cubana de hoy, la arenga del Movimiento Bolivariano Revolucionario, que de la mano y la mente de Hugo Chávez inauguró una nueva esperanza para América Latina ha reconocido siempre a Bolívar como su promotor verdadero.
Septiembre 28 de 2017.
Acoustic Manipulation Against Cuba
- English
- Español
Acoustic Manipulation Against Cuba
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive for the daily POR ESTO! of Merida, Mexico
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
The largest US association of travel organizers in Cuba, after holding an assembly of its members, issued a statement in which it unanimously disagrees with the decision of the US State Department to withdraw 60% of its Embassy staff from Cuba. Havana and its warning to US citizens to avoid their trips to Cuba.
As a result, the US Consulate in Havana suspended the issuance of visas for travel to the United States indefinitely, although it will continue to provide emergency services to US citizens when they are in Cuba.
The motivation for these actions is that it has been known that 21 US diplomats accredited in Havana have reported hearing problems of unknown origin.
“From the evidence available to date and from the fact that the State Department asserts that no other American citizen has been affected, we believe that such a decision is unjustified and, therefore, we will continue to organize trips to Cuba and encourage others to do so.” said Bob Guild, Co-Coordinator of RESPECT (Responsible Ethical Tourism of Cuba), a professional association made up of 150 representatives of travel agents, tour operators and other service providers related to trips to the island founded in December of 2016, on the anniversary of the opening of the Cuban-American dialogue.
Guild emphasized that US law allows citizens and US residents to travel to Cuba and there is no provision from the State Department that would in any way prohibit US citizens from visiting the island.
At the aforementioned RESPECT meeting, representatives of US commercial airlines traveling to Cuba express their intention to continue to do so.
Gail Reed, founder of the scientific journal MEDICC and deputy coordinator of RESPECT, said categorically in the proposal that “Cuba remains a very safe destination for travelers from the United States.”
At the invitation of the Cuban authorities, the FBI was in Havana earlier looking for evidence of what the United States has described as “sonic attacks” causing hearing loss and other symptoms, but its agents found no device or other evidence to explain the mystery.
None of the 500,000 US visitors to Cuba this year2017 have reported similar health problems and, according to Secretary of State Tillerson’s statement last week, “we have no reports from any other US citizen who has been affected …”.
Neither have had detours approximately two million deturistas of other countries that has visited Cuba in what goes of the present year.
Not a single guest has experienced in Cuba problems related to “hearing loss” or other health claims that concern the Trump administration.
Of the many thousands of foreign guests who were in Cubacuando the island was recently whipped from one end to the other by Hurricane “Irma” not one was damaged. Cuba remains one of the safest nations in the world for its guests and there are no drug wars, no terrorism, no arms trafficking, no gang wars, no kidnappings, no tropical pandemics.
The president of AFSA , an association representing 15,000 US diplomats around the world, Barbara Stephenson, has opposed any decision to withdraw diplomats from Cuba. He said that his members are against the reduction of the Embassy staff in Havana and that they are prepared to continue their mission regardless of whether there are real health problems. “We have to stay in the field and play,” Stephenson said.
In response to Washington’s move to reduce its embassy’s diplomatic staff in Cuba, Josefina Vidal, the Director General of US Affairs in the Cuban Foreign Ministry, called the decision a precipitous decision and considered that this will affect bilateral relations and cooperation in areas of interest mutual. Vidal had urged the United States not to politicize the issue and insisted that Cuba needs active cooperation from the US authorities to reach a definitive conclusion.
Obviously, we are in the presence of a new maneuver against Cuba of the sectors of the extreme right terrorist in the foreign policy of the American government. The insistence on the issue of representatives as representative of these sectors of US diplomacy as Republican Senator Marco Rubio confirms this hypothesis.
October 2, 2017.
MANIPULACION ACÚSTICA CONTRA CUBA
By Manuel E. Yepe
Exclusivo para el diario POR ESTO! de Mérida, México.
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
La mayor asociación estadounidense de organizadores de viajes a Cuba,luego de efectuar una asamblea de sus miembros, emitió una declaraciónen la que discrepa, por unanimidad, de la decisión del Departamento deEstado de su país de retirar el 60 % del personal de su Embajada de laHabana y de su advertencia a los ciudadanos estadounidenses de queeviten sus viajes a Cuba.
Derivado de ello, el Consulado estadounidense en La Habana suspendiópor tiempo indefinido la expedición de visas para viajar a EstadosUnidos, aunque seguirá prestando servicios de emergencia a losciudadanos estadounidenses cuando están en Cuba.
La motivación que se argumenta para estas acciones es que se habíaconocido que 21 diplomáticos Usamericanos acreditados en La Habana hanreportado problemas auditivos de origen ignorado.
“A partir de la evidencia disponible hasta el momento y del hecho deque el Departamento de Estado afirma que ningún otro ciudadanoestadounidense han sido afectado, creemos que tal decisión esinjustificada y, por tanto, continuaremos organizando viajes a Cuba yanimando a otros a hacerlo”, declaró Bob Guild, Co-Coordinador deRESPECT (por las siglas en ingles de Turismo Ético Responsable deCuba), una Asociación profesional integrada por 150 representantes deagencias de viajes, turoperadores y otros prestadores de serviciosrelacionados con los viajes a la isla fundada en diciembre de 2016, enel aniversario de la apertura del diálogo cubano-estadounidense.
Destacó Guild que las leyes estadounidenses permiten a los ciudadanosy residentes estadounidenses viajar a Cuba y no hay disposición algunadel Departamento de Estado que de alguna manera prohíba a ciudadanosde Estados Unidos visitar la isla.
En la arriba citada reunión de RESPECT, los representantes de lasaerolíneas comerciales de Estados Unidos que viajan a Cuba expresaronsu intención de continuar haciéndolo.
Gail Reed, fundadora de la revista científica MEDICC yvice-coordinadora de RESPECT, destacó categóricamente en la propiareunión que “Cuba sigue siendo un destino muy seguro para los viajerosde Estados Unidos”.
Por invitación de las autoridades cubanas, el FBI estuvo en La Habanaanteriormente buscando evidencias de lo que Estados Unidos ha descrito como “ataques sónicos” causantes de hipoacusia y otros síntomas, perosus agentes no encontraron dispositivo alguno u otra evidencia queexplicara el misterio.
Ninguno de los 500,000 visitantes de Estados Unidos a Cuba en este año2017 ha reportado problemas de salud similares y, según declaración deSecretario de Estado Tillerson de la semana pasada “no tenemosinformes de ningún otro ciudadano estadounidense que haya sidoafectado…”.
Tampoco han tenido contratiempos aproximadamente dos millones deturistas de otros países que ha visitado a Cuba en lo que va delpresente año.
Ni un solo huésped ha experimentado en Cuba problemas relacionados con”pérdida auditiva” u otros reclamos de salud que preocupan a laadministración de Trump.
De los muchos miles de invitados extranjeros que se hallaban en Cubacuando la isla fue recientemente azotada de una punta a la otra por elhuracán “Irma” ni uno solo sufrió daños. Cuba sigue siendo una de lasnaciones más seguras del mundo para sus huéspedes y, además, tampocohay guerras por la droga, ni por terrorismo, ni por tráfico de armas,ni guerras de pandillas, ni secuestros, ni hay pandemias tropicales.La presidenta de AFSA, asociación que representa a 15,000 diplomáticosde Estados Unidos en todo el mundo, Barbara Stephenson, se ha opuestoa cualquier decisión de retirar los diplomáticos de Cuba. Dijo que susmiembros están en contra de la reducción del personal de la Embajadaen La Habana y que están preparados para continuar a su misiónindependientemente de que hubiera problemas de salud reales osupuestos. “Tenemos que permanecer en el campo y en el juego”, alegóStephenson.
En respuesta a la medida de Washington de reducir el personaldiplomático de su Embajada en Cuba, Josefina Vidal, Directora Generalde asuntos de Estados Unidos en la Cancillería cubana, calificó ladecisión de precipitada y consideró que ello afectará las relacionesbilaterales y la cooperación en áreas de interés mutuo. Vidal habíainstado a los Estados Unidos a no politizar el asunto e insistió enque Cuba precisa de una activa cooperación de las autoridadesnorteamericanas para llegar a una conclusión definitiva.
Evidentemente, estamos en presencia de una nueva maniobra contra Cubade los sectores de la extrema derecha terrorista en la políticaexterior del gobierno estadounidense. La insistencia en el asunto depersoneros tan representativos de esos sectores de la diplomaciaestadounidense como el senador republicano Marco Rubio confirma estahipótesis.
Octubre 2 de 2017.
Trump Against the Rest of the World
Trump Against the Rest of the World at the UN
By Manuel E. Yepe
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Exclusive to the daily POR ESTO! of Mérida, Mexico.
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Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
The speech with which Donald Trump, as President of the country that hosts the world’s largest organization, inaugurated the 72nd session of the United Nations General Assembly, overshadowed even more the prospects for peaceful coexistence in the world. Far beyond offering evidence of his disrespect for the international community as a whole. Trump was particularly direct with regard to some of the most representative world powers, such as China, Russia, India and Iran, among others.
Perhaps It was Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, who had the most ingenious and educated response to Trump’s speech, which had been full of calls for violence, along with his arrogance, haughtiness and total disrespect for the world organization. When all the dignitaries present hoped that the Iranian leader would respond with justified indignation to Trump’s insulting characterization of his government as “a corrupt dictatorship behind the false appearance of democracy,” the Iranian leader contrasted Trump’s uncultured rhetoric with a fine reference to Persian literary masters of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.
“In order to promote our culture, civilization, religion and revolution, we enter into peoples’ hearts and capture their minds. We recite poetry and spread our philosophy in speeches. Our ambassadors are our poets, mystics and philosophers. We have flown to the shores of this side of the Atlantic through Yalal Al-Din Rümi extending our influence throughout Asia with Saadi (Musarrif ibn Muslih). We have already captured the world with Hafiz (Sams al-Din Muhammad), and we do not need new conquests, “quipped the head of the Persian government.
Rouhani used the word “moderation” no less than ten times, contrasting with Trump’s repeated use of the words “violence, chaos and bloodshed.” He even recited a poem with many healthy tips:
“Moderation seeks neither isolation nor hegemony; and it does not imply either indifference or intransigence”.
“The path of moderation is the way of peace; but a just and inclusive peace: not peace for a nation and war and agitation for others. Moderation is freedom and democracy; but in an inclusive and comprehensible way.”
“Do not pretend to promote liberty in one place by supporting dictators elsewhere; moderation is synergy of ideas and no dance of swords; the path of moderation nourishes beauty. Exports of lethal weapons are not beautiful; peace is.”
Dozens of heads of state, presidents of governments and other senior officials of the countries represented in the United Nations contributed to this 72nd session of the highest global organization without appealing to the arrogant language of Trump.
The United States, the dominant imperialist power in these times, now has a president at its head whose evident ineptitude confirms the total incapacity of the capitalist system to represent a unifying role of the world community that would serve to confront old and new challenges that stand in the way of survival.
It would seem that the spectacle offered by the UN General Assembly evidenced the fragmentation in which humanity lives. This starts with the distance between the head of state and government of the United States and his own people, and the insurmountable contradiction between the dominant power and the rest of the world .
When humanity’s articulated response to the challenges that are being imposed on it by nature is most needed, the President of the United States opposes everything positive that the international community has advanced in its fight against climate change.
The nearer the world has been to atomic war since the United States dropped its weapon on Japan, Trump announces the desire to “destroy” a nation possessing nuclear weapons, one which is not willing to sacrifice its sovereignty to imperialist impertinence.
Trump boycotts long-negotiated compromises for high-level nuclear issues with North Korea and with Iran in whose development his predecessors played sterner roles than he.
Today the planet needs the United Nations all the more as a center to harmonize the efforts of nations to achieve their common ends, to fulfill their role of maintaining world peace and security, to eliminate threats of war, to suppress acts of aggression and other breaches of peace. By contrast, the United States –in the voice and presence of its highest representative– boasted of its power to mobilize and railed against the world organization itself without sparing all kinds of lies.
September 25, 2017.
Cuba Recovered and Open
By Manuel E. Yepe Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann. USA Today reported on Sept. 17 that the US government was providing humanitarian aid to numerous Caribbean islands devastated by Hurricane Irma. Cuba, located just 90 miles off the coast of Florida – was not among them. When Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in 2005, Cuba was the first nation to offer aid. The island prepared thousands of volunteers and huge amounts of emergency equipment and supplies to assist the victims in the affected regions with all the expenses incurred by Cuba. Even on that occasion, Havana organized a permanent aid brigade to send to to countries affected by natural disasters that was named after a US citizen, Henry Reeve (1850-1876), who fought in an outstanding way in the Cuban independence ranks against Spanish colonialism, and who rose to the rank of Brigadier General. The US government of George W. Bush rejected the magnanimous Cuban aid offer, in spite of the enormous humanitarian catastrophe that was unfolding in Louisiana at the time. Katrina caused damage to the city of New Orleans, but it did not devastate it. Shortly afterwards, the Pontchartrain lake dams and several canals were broken. A toxic broth of contaminated water flooded the streets, as well as thousands of homes and beyond the second floor of tall buildings. Tens of thousands of people, almost all of them black and poor, had to fight for survival in the worst conditions of official abandonment. An estimated 300,000 families were made homeless. Nor was the offer of Cuban aid accepted at that time. At the moment, although Cuba is recovering from the serious damage caused by Hurricane Irma, it has not hesitated to give aid to neighboring islands that have suffered a misfortune similar to its own. Hundreds of professionals, with their assistants and medical supplies, have been sent by Havana in support their Caribbean neighbors. It is known that there are now hundreds of millions of dollars worth of food, medicine, and building materials being stored in the US military base that Washington illegally occupied more than a century ago, on the shores of Guantanamo Bay, on Cuban territory, in the easternmost part of Cuba. (This also includes the concentration camp whose inmates have no rights or trial as prisoners war). But it is also known that the US military base has not shared a single bottle of potable water with the Cuban residents affected by the hurricane outside the perimeter fencing at the base. Among other nations, they are providing assistance to Cuba, Argentina, Bolivia, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, China, Ecuador, El Salvador, Spain, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Dominican Republic, Russia, Uruguay, Venezuela and Vietnam, as well as some dependencies from the ONU. In contrast, the State Department has issued a warning against travel to Cuba and advises the Americans in that regard. Meanwhile, millions of Cuban volunteers have cleared the tracks that provide the most evidence of the destructive passage of Hurricane Irma. Tourists from the most diverse countries are already going massively to the island. By denying Cubans aid, and discouraging its citizens’ travel to Cuba, Washington is once again using the occurrence of a humanitarian disaster to punish Cubans for refusing to accept US meddling in their internal affairs. However, as the Canadian tour operator “Cuba Explorer”, which has been based for years in Havana, states in a message to its clients, “Americans are preparing to visit Cuba in large numbers in the coming months, aware that social tourism is a form humanitarian and economic aid. The travelers want to keep alive the new spirit of cooperation between the United States and Cuba that began during the Presidency of Barack Obama. “Cubans are showing their disposition and their desire to welcome and warmly welcome their arrival to the island to their American guests,” said the aforementioned US tour operator, based on his own experiences and expectations. September 18, 2017.
Por Manuel E. Yepe Exclusivo para el diario POR ESTO! de Mérida, México. El diario USA Today informó el 17 de septiembre que el gobierno de Estados Unidos estaba dando ayuda humanitaria a numerosas islas del Caribe devastadas por el huracán Irma. Cuba, situada a tan solo 90 millas de las costas de la Florida- no estaba entre ellas. Cuando el huracán Katrina golpeó a Nueva Orleans en 2005, Cuba fue la primera nación en ofrecer ayuda. La isla preparó miles de voluntarios y enormes cantidades de equipos y suministros de emergencia para ayudar a las víctimas en las regiones afectadas con todos los gastos sufragados por Cuba. Incluso en esa ocasión La Habana organizó una brigada permanente de ayuda a países afectados por desastres naturales que nombró Henry Reed (1850—1876), en honor a un ciudadano estadounidense que combatió de manera sobresaliente en las filas independentistas cubanas contra el colonialismo español, en las que alcanzó el grado de Brigadier General. El gobierno estadounidense de George W. Bush rechazó la magnánima oferta cubana de ayuda, a pesar de la enorme catástrofe humanitaria que se desplegaba en el estado de Luisiana en aquel momento. Katrina causó daños a la ciudad de Nueva Orleáns, pero no la devastó. Poco después, cuando los diques del lago Pontchartrain y varios canales se reventaron, un caldo tóxico de agua contaminada inundó las calles, así como miles de casas y hasta más allá del segundo piso de los edificios altos. Decenas de miles de personas, casi todas negras y pobres, debieron luchar por la supervivencia en las peores condiciones de abandono oficial. Se calcula que 300,000 familias quedaron sin techo. Tampoco fue aceptada entonces la oferta de ayuda cubana. En estos momentos, pese a que Cuba se está recuperando de los graves perjuicios que le causara el huracán Irma, no ha vacilado en prestar ayuda a las islas vecinas que han sufrido una desgracia semejante a la propia. Cientos de profesionales, con sus asistentes y suministros médicos, han sido enviados por La Habana en apoyo a sus vecinos del Caribe. Se conoce que en la base militar estadounidense que ilegalmente ocupa hace más de un siglo un espacio en la ribera de la bahía de Guantánamo, en territorio cubano, en la parte más oriental de Cuba (así como en el campo de concentración de sus prisioneros de guerra sin derecho a juicio que allí existen), hay actualmente alimentos, medicinas y materiales de construcción valorados en cientos de millones de dólares. Pero se sabe, igualmente, que la base militar estadounidense no ha compartido ni una sola botella de agua potable con los cubanos residentes afectados por el huracán fuera del vallado perimetral de la base. Entre otras naciones, están proporcionando ayuda a Cuba Argentina, Bolivia, Canadá, Colombia, Costa Rica, China, Ecuador, El Salvador, España, México, Nicaragua, Panamá, República Dominicana, Rusia, Uruguay, Venezuela y Vietnam, así como algunas dependencias de la ONU. En contraste, el Departamento de Estado ha dictado una advertencia contra los viajes a Cuba y asesora en ese sentido a los estadounidenses. Mientras tanto, millones de voluntarios cubanos han limpiado las huellas que más evidencian el destructivo paso de huracán Irma. Turistas de los más diversos países están acudiendo masivamente ya a la isla. Al negarle ayuda a los cubanos y desalentar los viajes a Cuba de sus ciudadanos, Washington está utilizando una vez más la ocurrencia de un desastre humanitario para castigar a los cubanos por negarse a aceptar la intromisión de Estados Unidos en sus asuntos internos. Sin embargo, como manifiesta en mensaje a sus clientes el turoperador canadiense “Cuba Explorer”, basado hace años en La Habana, “los estadounidenses se preparan para visitar Cuba en gran número en los próximos meses, conscientes de que el turismo social es una forma humanitaria y económica de ayuda. Los viajeros quieren mantener vivo el nuevo espíritu de cooperación entre Estados Unidos y Cuba que se inició durante la Presidencia de Barack Obama”. “Los cubanos están dando muestras de su disposición y sus deseos de dar la bienvenida y abrazar calurosamente a su llegada a la isla a sus invitados estadounidenses”, expresó el antes citado turoperador norteamericano, a partir de sus propias vivencias y expectativas. Septiembre 18 de 2017.
Cuba Recovered and Open to the World
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Exclusive to the daily POR ESTO! of Mérida, Mexico.CUBA SE RECUPERA Y SIGUE ABIERTA AL MUNDO
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Hurricanes and the Blockade Against Cuba
Hurricanes and the Blockade Against Cuba
By Manuel E. Yepe
http://manuelyepe.wordpress.com/
Exclusive to the daily POR ESTO! of Mérida, Mexico.
Translated and edited by Walter Lippmann.
Although the blockade of Cuba officially began on February 7, 1962, in practice it began in 1959, barely after the triumph of the popular revolution against the pro-American dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista. The recent tragedy that Hurricane Irma has meant for Cuba and several other countries in the Caribbean reminded me of a discussion I had exactly ten years ago with an American friend visiting Cuba. He maintained that Fidel Castro should be grateful to the US government for the blockade it had imposed on Cuba for half a century.
In that American friend’s opinion, it would have been extremely difficult, almost impossible, for Cubans to maintain the unity in action they have shown for the achievement of their great social, cultural, educational, scientific and economic advances, “had there not been the ferocious and stupid hostility against the island” of its powerful northern neighbor.
For this reason, he speculated, the Cuban government has acted very cleverly by not doing everything in its power to get the United States to suspend the economic blockade and normalize its relations with the island.
I argued against such speculation. I reminded him of the staunch position of the Cuban government against the blockade, the promotion it has been making for many years in favor of international agreements condemning it and Cuba’s permanent willingness to negotiate fairly all disputes with Washington.
It is unquestionable, I remarked, that the persistent pursuit of a dozen successive US governments of the blockade against Cuba has contributed to national unity. Similarly with Washington’s its policy of open and covert threats and aggressions. These have promoted Cuba’s popular unity policy which has, in turn, served to encourage the enthusiastic support of the population to the Revolution’s political project.
Similarly, hurricanes provide significant benefits through the torrential rains that enrich the water table, fill the reservoirs, and even renew the forests by knocking down old trees. Alas, their aftermath also strongly harms the population, with great damage caused by their wind, rain, tides and sea waves for the sake of such presumably beneficial effects.
Cuba is frequently hit by the powerful hurricanes that characterize its geographic location. Sometimes they do it with very short intervals to allow an effective recovery, but, every time this happens, I remember this exchange with my American friend.
Cubans are proud to belong to a people that offers such extraordinary demonstrations of unity, discipline, solidarity and creativity in facing these natural phenomena. Our avoidance of fatalities and intangible material effects, compared to other countries that do not have a similar organization based on solidarity, is a source of our pride.
I cannot avoid comparing this action by Cubans, which this people demonstrates in confrontation with the effects of the blockade, and against the hostility that the US has practiced against Cuba for almost 60 years.
Hurricanes bring water for sowing and dams; the blockade contributes to the firmness of the agreement by Cubans for national defense. But when one considers the magnitude of the material damage, the suffering, and the scourge that flows from the hurricanes and the blockade, everyone understands why hurricanes are so undesirable.
I hope meteorological science will someday be able to dissolve or divert hurricanes to uninhabited places. And that scientists will find ways and means to obtain the water they provide by other means.
Until that happens, it would be desirable if good sense moves the government of the United States to reject the blockade that it has exercised against Cuba.
Cubans will be able to find and improve –on increasingly democratic and permanent foundations– the mechanisms necessary to make the revolutionary project dreamed by Marti and Bolivar for our America irreversible.
Unfortunately for Cubans, to return to normalization after Irma’s devastating atmospheric phenomenon, also means living again under the conditions of the no less-devastating criminal phenomenon that is the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States on Cuba in its useless effort by to make the island return to the imperialist fold.
September 14, 2017.
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