From: Rakesh Bhandari (rakeshb@STANFORD.EDU)
Date: Thu May 22 2003 - 04:25:08 EDT
Fred wrote: >Hi Rakesh, > >I don't know how likely a US invasion is. I hope not very likely. >And it is our responsibility to make sure that it doesn't happen. > >But I can certainly understand why the Cubans think that a US invasion is >very likely, and are therefore preoccupied with preparations for defense >against an invasion. You can see it in their faces - they are scared to >death. Well that part's of the problem; as we know, all kinds of freedoms can be threatened when people are scared to death, and in the name of national security. For example, due process can be attenuated, and the resort to cruel and unusual punishment allowed. > We can afford to be wrong about an invasion, but the Cubans >can't. Don't think it's that simple. Can the Cubans afford to do without due process and without prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment? Do you think it's not for any non Cuban to have an opinion about whether too many rights and freedoms have been restricted as a result of heightened sense of danger? >If you were Cuban, with the decades of aggression by the US >against Cuba, right. Gore seemed as bellicose; Helms Burton was not vetoed by Clinton; Reagan invaded Grenada, not Cuba. It's not clear to me what exactly has changed in US policy, such that an invasion of Cuba is only now at the top of the agenda and crack down now justified. So the point would have to be that Bush II has fundamentally changed the doctrinal basis of US foreign policy which makes an invasion of Cuba now more likely than ever. But I see neither the basis on which Bush would attempt an invasion (WMD? UN resolution violations? support for terrorist networks even as Castro executes hijackers?) nor the remotest possibility of success. Again the ouster of Saddam could be attempted because he had only the narrowest base of support, and still look at the trouble which Bush has created for himself. I just don't see Bush risking an invasion of Cuba, but I say this so that someone can attempt to convince me otherwise. That is, can convince me that the threat of an imminent invasion is not being hyped in order to justify an attack on due process, prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment, press freedom and civil liberties. It is also possible that the gains of the Cuban Revolution could be sacrificed if people such as Mike Davis, Edward Said, Katha Pollitt, Noam Chomsky, Saramago Galeano don't voice their opposition to summary trials. I just don't think things are as one-sided as you are making out. >and now with the bellicose Bush administration who owe their >stolen election to the Miami Cubans, and to the disenfranchisment of US voters and to the Supreme Court and to the Democratic Party which just stood idly by as the election was stolen. Are you saying that Bush will invade Cuba to return the favor of those Miami Cubans even it would mean another embarrasing quagmire for him? They're going to vote for him anyway. > and who are riding high after >"victories" in Afghanastan and Iraq, wouldn't you assume the worst and >prepare for the worst? It could be that given how tied Bush's hands are in West Asia, the threat of a US invasion of Cuba is now less severe. I don't believe the hijackings were organized or allowed by the US in order to create a situation which will justify a US invasion. I don't see Bush invading on the behalf of hijackers! In all honesty, this makes no sense to me. Yours, Rakesh
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