How do the protests in Cuba challenge the US?
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Editor's Note:
Frida Ghitis, (@fridaghitis), a former CNN correspondent and producer, is a world affairs columnist.
She is a frequent CNN opinion writer, a contributing columnist for The Washington Post, and a columnist for the World Politics Review.
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(CNN) -
The Cuban regime is rolling out its highly practiced playbook in response to Sunday's impressive eruption of protests across the island. As virtually anyone who has reported from Cuba can tell you, the government's approach is familiar and widely used. It is a three-step maneuver that has worked in the past, allowing the regime to remain in power without responding to the demands of the people. This time, there is no guarantee that it will work.
The strategy I witnessed first-hand during reporting trips to Cuba for CNN in the 1990s is simple: First, when protesters risk speaking out loud and in numbers, authorities call in the masses of supporters to drown his critics.
The pro-regime crowds literally scream louder than the opponents.
Gloria Estefan: My father tried to liberate Cuba and so did I. 3:08
During an aborted protest that I covered, prior to the 1999 Ibero-American Summit in Havana, the government not only relied on the voices of its supporters, but brought out massive speakers blasting music at such a deafening volume that no voice could be heard.
The second part of the strategy is to recognize that there are problems at home, but to blame everything on the "empire": the United States.
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The use of brute force in Cuba
The third piece is brute force.
During that frustrated opposition rally in a Havana park, trucks stopped unloading dozens of men and surrounded anyone who dared to speak.
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I remember a man who raised his identity card, his voice shook and said: "I am Cuban, I have the right to speak."
Before the sentence ended, a swarm of men materialized, knocking him to the ground.
Then, plainclothes officers began to appear, grabbing individual protesters and throwing them into the back of unmarked cars that were speeding away.
That protest did not last long.
Later that night, I attended a meeting with then-President Fidel Castro.
He told a small group of journalists that critics of the regime were free to speak out, but that they had been silenced by patriotic Cubans who rose up spontaneously to defend their beloved revolution.
A change of era
Times are different now.
The iconic Castro is long gone, and gone with him is the charisma and stature that persuaded many Cubans to endure a chronic - and ongoing - shortage of basic necessities, including freedom.
The frustrations have been overwhelmed in Cuba because the economy, perennially struggling, is weakening.
Oil-rich Venezuela, once the generous patron of the regime, is barely afloat, a victim of its own mismanagement and repression.
"Libertad", the song by Emilio Estefan dedicated to Cuba 2:48
The shortage of food, electricity and other necessities is getting worse.
And as the coronavirus is emerging - in the worst form of what has been seen so far - the health system is overwhelmed.
The tourism market, a mainstay of the economy, was devastated by Covid-19 in 2020. Now, with the delta variant spreading across the island, efforts to rebuild its tourism revenue have stalled.
In Fidel's time, social networks barely existed in Cuba.
But this time, thanks to the videos uploaded and shared, it is not just a small group of brave opposition activists protesting.
Thousands of Cubans marched through the streets of many cities and towns on the island on Sunday, declaring "We are not afraid" and shouting "Freedom! Freedom!"
The protesters complained that they did not have enough to eat, but they not only asked for food, housing or work.
They asked for freedom.
That's why Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel's predictable televised speech on Sunday - see step two of the playbook - sounds empty.
He blamed US sanctions for the country's difficulties, accusing Washington and "the Cuban mafia" in Miami - short for the regime for Cuban exiles - of stoking the unrest.
By implementing the first step, of course, he urged supporters of the regime to confront the protesters.
"The order to fight has been given," he said, "the revolutionaries must be in the streets."
An economic claim or for freedom?
It is true that Washington has imposed harsh economic sanctions on Cuba.
Former President Donald Trump has tightened sanctions and President Joe Biden has maintained them.
But if the protests were only about the economy, the call for "freedom" would not occupy such a prominent place.
Biden issued a strong statement supporting the protesters' demands.
"We support the Cuban people and their clamor for freedom and relief from the tragic control of the pandemic and decades of repression," and urged Cuban leaders to "listen to their people."
After all, this is an opportunity, however distant, for peaceful change.
Cubans have had tough times before.
This wave of protests can come and go, as others have.
But what happened across the island was not routine.
Demonstrations of this magnitude have not occurred in decades.
The last time, in 1994, Castro released the pressure by allowing the Cubans to leave.
Back then, the government practically prohibited Cubans from leaving their country, requiring that they first be approved for an "exit visa."
But simply opening the door would not work now, because in 2012, the government lifted the decades-long ban.
Biden's review of Trump's restrictive policies toward Cuba is still underway
That leaves step three: brute force.
This part of the strategy deserves to be watched closely.
If the protests continue, the regime will face a difficult decision about how difficult it is to crack down.
Cuba is an authoritarian regime, but it is wrapped in a mystique.
The broader the repression, the more difficult it is to defend its image as a government of and for the people.
If we see much more violence from the security forces, we will know that the authorities are deeply concerned about losing control.
So far, we have seen arrests and some violence, but the scale is still limited.
The geopolitical question about Cuba
So far, Biden's words have been carefully crafted so as not to give Havana fuel to fuel the claim that the United States is to blame for the unrest.
But National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan warned against "violence or attacks against peaceful protesters exercising their universal rights."
How do the protests in Cuba challenge the US?
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Meanwhile, the Kremlin, a supporter of the Cuban regime, has issued its own warning against foreign intervention, a reminder of Cuba's enduring geopolitical resonance.
The Cuban regime's playbook has helped it stay in power for more than six decades.
It might work again, but as we've all learned, the story is full of twists and turns.
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