But the highest levels of the Cuban hierarchy - a handful of people with a lot of power - would not hesitate. They completely back Fidel."
They like being in power. Being one of the masses, just won't cut it.
More than 90 percent of all Cuban diplomats assigned to New York and Washington are engaged in espionage.
It's worse than that!!!
Sept. 29, 2001, 11:53PM/ Analyst at Pentagon arrested on charges of spying for Havana / FBI says espionage goes back 5 years / By CHRISTOPHER MARQUIS / New York Times ****In 1992 or 1993, she pulled off what seemed to be an intelligence coup. She traveled to Cuba and interviewed Cuban generals about economic reforms on the island. In 1998, she played an important role in drafting a widely cited analysis that found that Cuba's much diminished military posed no strategic threat to the United States. As recently as the week before last, she briefed top Pentagon policy-makers on Cuba. According to the FBI affidavit, Montes, who had a high-level security clearance, spied for Cuba for at least five years, and possibly longer. She identified at least one U.S. undercover agent to the Cubans, disclosed a top-secret intelligence-gathering program and reported on U.S. training in the Caribbean, the FBI said. Current and former U.S. officials say she was in a position to tell have told Havana virtually everything the intelligence community knew about Cuba's military and might even have disclosed U.S. contingency plans for taking the island by force.***
Changing U.S. policy to ease the economic embargo or travel restrictions on Cuba would help prolong the regime.
Cuba woos heart of U.S. with trade - Reich: "…irrational interest by the Farm Bureau"***(Otto) Reich also suggested that U.S. businesses are being used by Cuba's political sympathizers and being suckered by Castro. "What we believe he wants to do here is to entice the U.S. agricultural community by buying relatively small amounts . . . to entice them with cash purchases so that we open up markets and have, quote, normal trade relationships," Reich said. That would mean allowing Cuba to buy goods on credit. He points to Cuba's billions in unpaid debts to other trading partners, saying the U.S. would be left "holding the bag" like other countries.
"If (Castro) can pay in cash, the administration is not going to stand in the way, but I think people should be very careful who goes down there," Reich said of U.S. business executives. "They're going to go to the Tropicana, they're going to listen to Cuban music, which is very nice, and eat Cuban food, which by the way the Cubans don't have access to, and they're going to stay in hotels the Cubans are not allowed to stay in."
…Asked if he thinks U.S. food and agriculture exporters, while operating within the law, are not acting in the national interest in pursuing Cuba's business, Reich answered: "Yes, I would make that (argument). Because - and they have the right to do it - it is delaying the transition to democracy in Cuba."***
"As long as there are no reforms improving the level of life for the Cuban people, there should be no friendly discussions toward Castro," he said.
He's exactly right! When do you reward someone for oppression, terrorism and espionage? This is the question to ask those who want to give him something for nothing. He's earned the embargo. Let him begin the process of reform before we give him so much as a look at a carrot.