Back Channel to Cuba: The Hidden History of Negotiations between Washington and Havana

10. INTIMATE ADVERSARIES, POSSIBLE FRIENDS

402 10. intimate adversaries, possible friends We both made mistakes, but it is time to put the past behind us. —President Raúl Castro to U.S. congressional delegation led by Senator Patrick Leahy, February 19, 2013 “Mr. President, I am Castro,” Raúl said as he reached out to shake hands with the president of the United States. “I know,” Barack Obama replied, smiling. Their encounter lasted just a few seconds, but it was historic—the first time since 1959 that a U.S. president met publicly with the president of Cuba. Neither government was willing to say that the handshake implied any warming of relations, but the sheer normalcy of this simple gesture was itself unusual in a relationship long fraught with tension and distrust. Its symbolism was underscored by the occasion; the two leaders met at the December 10, 2013, memorial service for Nelson Mandela, where Obama praised the spirit of forgiveness and reconciliation Mandela exemplified. “We can choose a world defined not by our differences, but by our common hopes,” Obama intoned. “We can choose a world defined not by conflict, but by peace and justice and opportunity.”1 Cuba had been on Obama’s mind of late. At a fundraising dinner in Miami a few weeks earlier, he acknowledged that important changes were under way on the island and expressed his frustration with the policy stalemate. “We have to be creative and we have to be thoughtful and we have to continue to update our policies,” he told his listeners. “Keep in mind that when [Fidel] Castro came to power I was just born, so the notion that the same policies that we put in place in 1961 would somehow still be as effective . . . in the age of the internet, Google and world travel, doesn’t make sense.”2 ReturningfromSouthAfrica,RaúltooexpressedhishopethatCubaandthe United States might “establish civilized relations,” and reiterated his offer to intimate adversaries, possible friends 403 open “a respectful dialogue” with Washington. “If we really want to make progress in bilateral relations,” he told Cuba’s National Assembly, “we must learn to mutually respect our differences and get used to coexisting peacefully.”3 As the remarks by both presidents suggested, beneath the complex knot of conflict between Cuba and the United States lies a rich vein of mutual concerns, shared culture, and common humanity. Across half a century, their turbulent relations have been marked by the interplay of interests in conflict and interests in common. Since 1959, Washington has tried everything except direct intervention to force Cuba back into the political and economic orbit of the United States. Cuba has done everything to maintain U.S. president Barack Obama shakes hands with Cuban president Raúl Castro at the memorial service for former South African president Nelson Mandela, December 10, 2013. The handshake between the leaders of two Cold War enemies came during a ceremony focused on Mandela’s legacy of reconciliation. (AP Photo) 404 intimate adversaries, possible friends the independent, socialist path Fidel Castro charted in 1959–60. Nevertheless , there has always been a countervailing impetus toward rapprochement. The very same closeness that made the conflict so intense also created an incentive in both capitals to find ways to cooperate—especially when coercion and defiance alone simply prolonged the conflict rather than resolving it. These “closest of enemies,” as retired U.S. diplomat Wayne Smith called Cuba and the United States, needed each other’s cooperation to deal effectively with a range of issues important to them both.4 Yet for more than fifty years, Cuba and the United States have not been able to consummate a reconciliation . The two nations remain stuck in a relationship of hostility that is both a relic of the Cold War and an impediment to the national interests of both. Why hasn’t there been more progress toward better relations after half a century? First, real conflicts of interest lie at the heart of the dispute. By severing Cuba’s economic and political dependence on the United States, Fidel Castro did serious harm to U.S. economic interests on the island and to U.S. political interests across the hemisphere. Cuba’s alliance with the Soviet Union challenged U.S. security interests, symbolized most obviously by the 1962 missile crisis, but also manifested in Cuban efforts to extend its revolutionary socialist model abroad. As the State Department explained in 1964, “The primary danger we...