Cuba's army.

B

BerettaCougar

New member
I was just speaking with an old man that lives on my street, he speaks really broken english. so our conversation didnt get into as much detail as I wanted it to.

He came to the country when Castro dumped his prison system to the US. He released almost everyone only if they agree to leave the country.

The only ones not released were the prisoners scheduled for extermination (deathrow).

He was put in prison because he did not allow his children to join the army, he said he was in the army for 10 years and the things they do made him decide to not allow his kid's to join, he said one day the kids were spotted outside durring school hours and they were brought to a police station and the kids were old enough to be in the army but were not registered for the non-voluntary services, they were brought to jail and their only parent (the old man) was brought to jail too, he was charged with not registering his children. He and his kids served several years, he said what hurt him the most was, that he knew his children were in the same prison, but he was not allowed to see them or make contact with them for several years. He to this day has not seen or heard of his eldest son, he made contact with the younger one on their sail to the states, they happened to be on the same boat.

The old man was crying and he had pictures of him in his uniform, and of his kids, and one of his younger son now. I had to hold back a tear there a few times, this guy is full of history, and his tragedy deserves to be heard, to make people aware of the current problems going on in Cuba (Communist country only 90 miles from us)

He also told me of other things going on in Cuba.
Random searches of houses, if you have anything that the military/police think is anti Castro...like an American flag... you will never be seen again.

If you speak in public against Castro... several years in prison or a bullet in the head at the expense of the family is the common resolution.

Several beaches are marked off as TOURIST only, if a Cuban citizen is caught on TOURIST only property, they will be put in jail.

The military protects drug cartels like if they were government officials.
He said this was his job back when he was in the military..provide protection for drug cartels.

Too much to type and not enough time.
I'll post the pics this guy has later. they add more emotions to the story.
 
Y'know, all those narrow minded liberals who visited Cuba and said it was better than the States shoulda stayed there and see how it really is.
 
Cuba is certainly no paradise but just as narrow minded liberals argue that it is, narrow minded conservatives argue the reasons for it. Cuba is a hellhole largely because of American sanctions. Castro's no saint but the only reason he's on the US's bad guy list is because when he came to power he decided to no longer allow rich American businessmen to use his country and his people as their playground. Many of those angered businessmen and their sons are now in high power positions in government and the business world in one of the most important states in the electoral college. Cuba remains sanctoined because angered Floridians demand it.


Again, I would never claim that Cuba is a good place to live (for most, I have certainly met people from there who live very good lives and some who wish they'd never left) but to blame it all on Castro being a meanie-head is just ridiculous.

edit: one more note; Castro's a pretty nasty dude and Cuba is mostly a hole, but NOT because of Communism. Communism by itself is not evil nor does it breed evil...it just happens to be one of the easiest forms of government/economy for dictators to establish
 
Redworm: I would agree with most of what you said. In fact, as far as Cuba having a lot of poor, there is no escaping that this is not *purely* the result of Castro's economic policies. The US has deliberately had a large role to play in improverishing the Cuban people.

The US has maintained a trade embargo against Cuba for decades (and we are not only geographically the closest market, but we are the world's largest market). Now, Castro may not be a saint, but you can't have powerful policies designed to impoverish a nation and then turn around and say "Look how bad he is - so many people are poor!". From Wikipedia:
The United States embargo against Cuba (described in Cuba as el bloqueo, Spanish for "the blockade") is an economic, commercial and financial embargo imposed on Cuba by the United States on February 7, 1962. As of 2005, the embargo is still in effect, making it one of the most enduring trade embargoes in modern history. It remains an extremely controversial issue worldwide, with the General Assembly of the United Nations condemning it for the 13th time in 2004 by a huge margin.
Click to expand...

Not only does the US have an embargo, but, since 1996, we have used our power to force other nations to also enforce our embargo, completely isolating Cuba economically. From Wikipedia:
...the Helms-Burton Act of 1996. This law states, among other things, that any non-US company that "knowingly traffics in property in Cuba confiscated without compensation from a U.S. person" can be subjected to litigation and that company's leadership can be barred from entry into the United States. Effectively, this covers any dealings with Cuba because everything is in some way connected to something that has been confiscated in the late 1950's. Sanctions may be applied to non-U.S. companies trading with Cuba. This means that internationally operating companies have to choose between Cuba and the US, which is a much larger market.
Click to expand...

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_embargo_against_Cuba

Of course, the hope of these policies is that by making life completely miserable for the Cuban people, Castro will be removed there. Obviously, our government couldn't care less about the Cuban people, or they wouldn't try to subject them to suffering they can't endure to get rid of their president. This is purely idealogical.
 
Castro's no saint but the only reason he's on the US's bad guy list is because when he came to power he decided to no longer allow rich American businessmen to use his country and his people as their playground.
Click to expand...
Nonsense.

Castro's Cuba has been a major source of unrest and upheaval throughout central and south America, and also sub-saharan Africa. Even today, Venezuela is on the brink of civil war due to his influence over Chavez.

It is also a major part of the international drug trade, and various other unsavory criminal activity.
The US has deliberately had a large role to play in improverishing the Cuban people.
Click to expand...
Again, nonsense.

Cuba has plenty of trade to Europe, Canada, Africa, Asia, and the rest of Central America. Cuba is poor for one reason: the cleptocratic socialist dictatorship that runs it.
 
Cuba is poor for one reason: the cleptocratic socialist dictatorship that runs it.
Click to expand...
If you are denying that economic sanctions have any economic effects... I don't really know what to say - baffling. :confused: What about the economic sanctions we imposed on Iraq - no economic effects there either? :confused: Why do we do this to countries governed by regimes we oppose if there is as you say, no effect? :confused: Are our political leaders just completely brainless?

To choose another example, surely you think that pricing of goods and labor in China has had an effect on US business, right? If so, I will point out that that influence is like a tiny ripple compared to a complete economic blockade enforced by the US and those that are forced to go along with it. What would happen to the US economy if Europe, China, Japan, and a smattering of other nations declared trade with the US illegal? No biggie? We'd just trade with Mexico and Canada and all would be fine?

Also from the same Wikipedia Embargo page:
Effects of the embargo
The Cuban Assets Control Regulations impose restrictions on imports to the U.S. from Cuba and exports from the U.S. to Cuba (including gifts of goods and cash) and on transactions with Cuba or Cuban nationals, impose a "total freeze" or "block" on Cuban assets and financial dealings with Cuba that enter the U.S. or come under U.S. jurisdiction, and restrict travel to Cuba (subject to certain exceptions and licensing). As of 2005, the Regulations are still in force and are administered by the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control. Criminal penalties for violating the embargo range up to ten years in prison, $1 million in corporate fines, and $250,000 in individual fines; civil penalties up to $55,000 per violation may also be imposed.

In 1958, the U.S. accounted for 67 percent of Cuba's exports and 70 percent of its imports

One of the more visible manifestations of the embargo is the low number of modern automobiles on the streets of Cuba. Instead, Cubans have made a virtue out of the necessity of keeping pre-1960 American automobiles in running order, making Cuba a haven for 1950s vintage American cars. Also, due to the general slowing of the economy in Cuba, the country has fostered many artisans as opposed to industrialists, further boosting the centuries-old culture of musicians, artists and poets that is well respected around the world, especially Cuban music.
Click to expand...

So, considering only the direct effect of US trade (and not all the other countries forced to follow suit by the 1996 law), Cuba lost 67 percent of exports and 70 percent of imports. No biggie?
 
If you are denying that economic sanctions have any economic effects... I don't really know what to say - baffling.
Click to expand...
How is it baffling?

The US is hardly the only market in the world, Cuba has full access to all the other countries as I listed. It makes a convienent scapgoat to blame the US for Cuba's economic woes, but the truth is even if there was no embargo, the average Cuban would still be poor, and the Cuban elite would still be rich.
 
The US is hardly the only market in the world, Cuba has full access to all the other countries as I listed.
Click to expand...
Well, we made up 70% of their trade before we began the embargo, as pointed out in the previous post. Likewise, as pointed out in the previous post, no they do not have full access to all the other countries - the Helms-Burton Act of 1996 is an attempt to deny them that as well.

Look, I am not advocating Castro here. But you have to be realistic and fair in criticisms. The US is also a big part of the problem in Cuba. It's the goal of our policies to be a big problem there. We try to get at him, by hitting the people.
 
But the US is the largest market in the world and if you think sanctions have no effect then, with all due respect, you don't understand the idea behind them.

You're right, Cuba has been a major source of upheavel but claiming that the US had no influence upon that is like claiming that terrorist attacks are completely uninfluenced by past US actions.

Also, the international drug trade is only problem because the various governments of the world, starting with ours, made it a problem. Were it not for the prohibition on drugs both Cuba and Columbia would lose a large chunk of the cashflow brought in by the aforementioned illegal drug trade.

Like I said, Castro is no saint but were it not for the sanctions Cuba would not be the place it is today. Communism and Socialism are not the causes of these problems. A form of government is not inherently evil.
 
But the US is the largest market in the world and if you think sanctions have no effect then, with all due respect, you don't understand the idea behind them.
Click to expand...
If Cuba was a world-class exporter of things of great demand in the US, I'd agree. But that's not the case.

The two major exports of Cuba are sugar and tobacco. The US is also a major exporter of those commodities. Exactly how is Cuba going to sell their sugar and tobacco to America, which is busy exporting those very same things? No, they'd have to export to exactly the places they're exporting to now. Which means, the embargo has little impact on the economics of Cuba.
Castro is no saint but were it not for the sanctions Cuba would not be the place it is today.
Click to expand...
I disagree. I think Cuba would be pretty much the same, except that perhaps the rich would be marginally richer, the plight of the average person would be the same. A corrupt socialist government has impoverished many other nations other than Cuba, to blame America for this is entirely wrongheaded. Let the people of Cuba have an honest democratic government, and they'll be well on the way to wealth.
 
I guess we'll just have to disagree. Just because we export something doesn't mean the importation of that same product isn't a large market. You've already seen the numbers that show the sanction was a major break in their economy.

An honest democracy like ours, right?

oh wait...
 
"Communism by itself is not evil nor does it breed evil..."

I learn something new every day.

John

P.S. - I see now that it's our fault Castro wanted Russian missles. He didn't really want to nuke us.
 
Cuba is a hellhole largely because of American sanctions.
Click to expand...

?

So are we reason that North Korea is so bad? Viet Nam? Tibet? Zimbabwe? Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany and Estonia before 1990?

The poorest people in the world can keep themselves clean and keep their area policed, can grow their own food, darn their own sox and teach their children how to read. They usually will do so if they are not prevented it by threat of force or trained to wait on the government to tell them what to do.
 
It is a sad day when an ONLINE WEBSITE is touted as fact. Wikipedia is nice, but please, get the Britannica if you really want to have some weight.

As for cuba, do you really think it is a good idea to give that madman more money and power? Really. I feel for the people, but IT IS CASTRO that is causing that problem. All he needs to do is stop down and embrace democracy.

I thought it was only the weak minded who pointed the finger at their own country (presumably). Now I realize that others have been infected with the disease as well.
 
As for cuba, do you really think it is a good idea to give that madman more money and power?
Click to expand...
Ehhh, now wait, how do economic sanctions against Cuba hurt Castro's bank account?

How did economic sanctions against Iraq hurt Saddam Hussein's bank account?

Broad based economic sanctions only cause general economic decline in a country - they do not do *anything* to target a particular individual. In fact, if the individual is a corrupt tyrant, he will likely ensure that he continues to do well, even if the country suffers. Smart policy. :rolleyes:

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations:
http://www.fao.org/WAICENT/faoinfo/economic/giews/english/alertes/srirq997.htm
Prior to the Gulf war in 1990, Iraq had one of the highest per capita food availabilities in the region, due to its relative prosperity and capacity to import large quantities of food, which met up to two-thirds of food requirements. The imposition of UN sanctions in August 1990 have, however, significantly constrained Iraq’s ability to earn foreign currency needed to import sufficient quantities of food to meet needs. As a consequence, food shortages and malnutrition became progressively severe and chronic in the 1990s. Widespread starvation was avoided due to an effective public rationing system, which provided minimum quantities of food to the population.
Click to expand...

According to a 1999 study by UNICEF on child mortality following the imposition of sanctions:
The first surveys since 1991 of child and maternal mortality in Iraq reveal that in the heavily-populated southern and central parts of the country, children under five are dying at more than twice the rate they were ten years ago. UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy said the findings reveal an ongoing humanitarian emergency.
Click to expand...

So, a country with abundant food became one in which food shortages and malnutrition were the order of the day, and children were dying at twice the former rate. Now, Saddam Hussein was still sitting in his gilded palaces, drinking the finest wines while all this was happening - so the only ones being being hurt by these sanction policies were the innocent.

Just what is it that can be achieved by running down the economy in a nation governed by a tyrant??? :confused:
 
:rolleyes: yes because that's exactly what I'm saying

Once again, America is the land that can do no wrong?

Look, I never claimed that America was responsible for all the trouble in the world. That's something that narrow minded liberals tend to spout and on the opposite end, narrow minded conservatives accuse people like me of blaming everything on America because I happen to call the lies as I see them.

Is America wholly responsible for the troubles in Cuba? No. Is it completely without responsibility? Of course not! The whole POINT behind a sanction is to cause economic hardship. The only reason the embargo against Cuba exists is for the specific purpose of keeping Cuba poor. There is no other reason. None. Period.

So to think that it's not in any way responsible is complete lunacy.


Sure Castro wanted to fire nukes at us. Why? Cause he's a grumpy old coot that doesn't like our flag? No, because rich businessmen from America had been messing with his country and his people for just as long as he's been doing now and with the same horrifying results.
 
Castro's no saint but the only reason he's on the US's bad guy list is because when he came to power he decided to no longer allow rich American businessmen to use his country and his people as their playground.
Click to expand...

Couldn't have anything to do with the fact that they were allies with our enemy for 40 years, could it? Or that whole missile deal? Or the fact that one guy grabbed power, and has remained the head of the country since the 50's? Or, a multitude of other reasons?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top