History will undoubtedly remember Fidel Castro in connection with the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. The showdown was triggered by the US discovery that the Soviet Union was installing in Cuba nuclear missiles capable of reaching the American soil. Before the dust finally settled, the crisis brought mankind to the brink of nuclear annihilation.
Was Castro excessively overzealous in inviting nuclear weapons a mere 90 miles from Florida? To him, the weapons were a deterrent to American provocations. After all, in April 1961 the US had sponsored the Bay of Pigs, the abortive invasion of Cuba to topple the Castro regime.
Since the 1959 Cuban Revolution, American policy towards Cuba has been unduly hostile. It has sustained brutal economic sanctions against the small island of 15 million people simply because US differed with its socialist ideology. Is this a case of the Cuban tail wagging the American dog?
During the 1979 Non-Aligned Movement Summit in Havana, I personally witnessed the impact of the socialist ideology that so alarmed the Americans. I saw makeshift healthcare shacks, including dental clinics, on the streets of Havana, offering free services. The US is still struggling to devise universal health coverage for its citizens.
I do not speak Spanish, Cuba's only language, but the sense of dignified affirmation was unmistakable among Cubans. This included a Black policewoman who directed heavy Havana rush-hour traffic. Her body language said it all. She knew that she was somebody, a Cuban by right, and Cuba was her society. Unequivocally, she knew that the colour of her skin was not held against her. The sense of insecurity, alienation and defiance so commonplace among non-whites of North America was conspicuously missing.
Absence of crime in Havana was startling. Inevitably, security for international delegates to the Havana Summit was crucial to the Cuban authorities. Yet, we were not assigned protection, armed or unarmed, on the streets of Havana or anywhere. And, no place was no-go zone. Amid all this, I kept recalling that Cuba was the only third world country that exported doctors and technicians as an official policy.
Mandela's testimony
By all indications, the Cuban socialist system was not so bad after all; it seemed to work for Cubans. Should they have dropped it just to suit the whims of the US?
Regarding Global Africa, Castro's foreign policy was informed by two fundamental convictions: that Cuba's liberation from Spain in the 19th Century required and got active co-operation of Black Cubans. Additionally, the Cuban society is what it is because of inputs of Afro-Cubans. They injected vital elements into the way that all Cubans think, act, eat, celebrate, dance, organise and defy. In sum, Castro leadership felt a profound sense of indebtedness to Africa, a compensation owed.
On his Inauguration Day as the first democratically elected President of South Africa in 1994, Nelson Mandela gave Fidel Castro a big bear hug and whispered, "We owe this day to you". Was Mandela overstating the case?
In 1987 and 1988 Cubans, alongside Angolan MPLA forces, engaged apartheid South African troops for 137 days in Southern Angola, ultimately driving them back to Namibia. Though not crushed, the apartheid war machine was deeply humiliated by the defeats in those series of battles in Cuito Canavale. The myth of invincibility of the white military machine in Southern Africa was forever shattered. The Cuban-MPLA triumphs so humiliated and demoralised the apartheid regime that its eventual liquidation was inevitable.
The political fallout of the Cuito Canavale encounters was indeed far-reaching. With South Africa's military intrusions out of the way, Angola focused on consolidating its independence. The way for Namibia's independence was also paved. Military resistance within South Africa was intensified. Finally, in February 1990, the ANC ban was lifted and Nelson Mandela freed.
Clearly, Castro's Cuba had much to do with the liberation of Southern Africa. And all Cuba expected in return was for its soldiers to be allowed to "bring home the remains of their dead". Indeed, Mandela meant every word in stating that Castro had played a crucial role in his nation's liberation.
While withdrawing from public life, Fidel Castro has left this world more just than he found it. Who could ask for more?
Article Source: http://www.afroarticles.com/article-dashboard
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