By now most PJM readers have heard about or looked at Atlantic magazine correspondent Jeffrey Goldberg’s scoop of the year — his invitation to travel to Cuba and have an exclusive meeting with Fidel Castro. The dictator, it seemed, read Goldberg’s Atlantic cover story about Iran and Israel, and requested that Goldberg travel to Cuba so he could talk about the issue with him.
Of course, what Castro wanted to really accomplish was to use Goldberg as a conduit for his ideas — to let the world know his most recent thoughts and also to send a message to those considered his long-standing allies, Ahmadinejad in Iran and Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. What Castro told them is that a nuclear war between Iran and Israel must be averted and that Ahmadinejad should “stop slandering the Jews.”
Was this Castro’s message to Jews on the eve of the Jewish New Year? Has the man who for years backed and trained PLO terrorists during Yasser Arafat’s heyday, and who supported the USSR’s anti-Semitic and anti-Israel policies, actually reevaluated and moved towards a new Cuban policy?
The truth is we don’t know. Whatever his motives, to have Fidel Castro announce that essentially Ahmadinejad is both wrong and probably crazy is some kind of unexpected breakthrough. Goldberg writes:
Castro’s message to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran, was not so abstract, however. Over the course of this first, five-hour discussion, Castro repeatedly returned to his excoriation of anti-Semitism. He criticized Ahmadinejad for denying the Holocaust and explained why the Iranian government would better serve the cause of peace by acknowledging the “unique” history of anti-Semitism and trying to understand why Israelis fear for their existence.
I am as opposed as the next person is to the Castro dictatorship, but this is, one has to admit, the most unexpected announcement by Castro one might have ever expected to hear. Will Chavez get the message as well, and suddenly change course and sabotage his great ally in Iran? Somehow, I doubt it. But think of how he must feel having heard this from his hero.
And then this:
He said the Iranian government should understand the consequences of theological anti-Semitism. “This went on for maybe two thousand years,” he said. “I don’t think anyone has been slandered more than the Jews. I would say much more than the Muslims. They have been slandered much more than the Muslims because they are blamed and slandered for everything. No one blames the Muslims for anything.” The Iranian government should understand that the Jews “were expelled from their land, persecuted and mistreated all over the world, as the ones who killed God. In my judgment here’s what happened to them: Reverse selection. What’s reverse selection? Over 2,000 years they were subjected to terrible persecution and then to the pogroms. One might have assumed that they would have disappeared; I think their culture and religion kept them together as a nation.” He continued: “The Jews have lived an existence that is much harder than ours. There is nothing that compares to the Holocaust.” I asked him if he would tell Ahmadinejad what he was telling me. “I am saying this so you can communicate it,” he answered.
And next Castro admitted that during the Cuban nuclear crisis in 1962, when he urged the Soviets to consider a nuclear strike against the USA, “it wasn’t worth it all.” This may be the first time the Cuban leader said he was wrong about anything.
As the old TV jingle went, CASTRO CONVERTIBLE!
Michael Moore exploding like Mr Creosote in 5…4…3…2…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXH_12QWWg8&feature=fvst
I wouldn’t be surprised it this turns out to be the biggest hoax since the Clifford Irving/Howard Hughes book.
Jeffrey Goldberg and Julia Sweig are not hoaxers. They may sometimes be a bit naive—but this interview is most assuredly the real deal. Fidel Castro may even be genuinely sincere. Still, action speaks louder than words. The United States government must insist on readily verifiable reforms. Sweig is the author of Inside The Cuban Revolution: Fidel Castro And The Urban Underground. It is unintentionally funny. Castro took full advantage of the “useful idiot” sons and daughters of the Cuban middle class. Sweig rejects “the “founding fathers” myth: that a handful of bearded rebels with a rural peasant base singlehandedly took on and defeated a standing army, thereby overthrowing the dictator and bringing the revolutionaries to power.”
Then again, if you don’t quite understand the meaning of the term “I wouldn’t be surprised”, perhaps you share their naivité. Not much surprises me these days. Just saying, is all. Carry on.
If Castro IS sincere in his remarks, it is truly one of the biggest about-turns in someone’s ideology I’ve ever encountered.
Castro tried VERY hard to get the Soviets to launch nukes at the US during the Cuban Missile Crisis, even though he understood the consequences for Cuba and the world. He used diplomatic communications with the Soviets – I’ve read the English translations of his remarks at the George Washington University archive online – to beg/demand that the Soviets nuke America over American interference in Cuba. He also had various deputies agitate the Soviet soldiers at the actual missile sites to launch those missiles. The missile sites, which were operational, were staffed by Soviets and the Cubans never had their hands on the button. But Castro arranged for these sites to be ringed by Cuban activists who loudly demanded that they fire their missiles at the gringos.
For him to come out against the Iranians and their nuclear ambitions at this time may show that he is finally, finally reaching some level of maturity/wisdom in his old age. Similarly, his acknowledgement that Cuban communism isn’t working out very well is very VERY refreshing to hear.
But talk is cheap. Given that he is still powerful and influential, I defy him to actually ACT upon these observations. A good start would be to finally have those free and democratic elections that he promised back in 1959.
If he simply makes those remarks about Iran and Cuban communism but does nothing about them when he has the power to act, I will be unable to believe that he has sincerely learned ANYTHING. Instead, he may just be mouthing the regrets that come readily to some old men that signify little beyond a dissatisfaction with the way things turned out.
If he really means those things, he needs to act.
As usual there are no hard questions for the “Great Man” to answer. He merely dictates his utterances to one who is delighted to report them.
This interview is a surprise, especially since Castro acolyte Thugo Chavez has both been aligning himself with Ahmadinejad and has ratcheted up anti-Semitism in Venzuela. Hezbollah is said to have a free hand in Venezuela.
At the same time, I am reminded of interviews through the decades in which Fidel comes across as a very knowledgeable person. The only problem is that while the central government controlling a communist economy is an inferior decision maker to the myriad of decision makers in a free market economy, similarly Fidel Castro, for all his intelligence, is likewise inferior to the myriad of decision makers in a free market economy.
While this may be a sincere foreign policy move, I do not believe that Cuba under the Castros will make any significant moves towards a freer economy. They have been running it all for over a half century. Habits are hard to break for an octegenarian.
Maybe Castro in seeing the Chavez alignment with Ahmadinejad is starting to cotton on to what Iran is all about and realizes that Cuba is going to lose its pole position in South American politics to Iranian hegemony.
By the way anybody aware of the conversions to Islam going on in Brazil’s favelas? Already in the south of the country there is a significant Muslim populace on the frontier with Praguay and Argentina.
Cynic:
Do you have any reference on Islam in the favelas? This is actually a terrifying prospect. For drug dealers, it would be very handy to play the “religion persecution” card to protect their business onto a population totally ignorant about Islam.
I read an 800 page biography of Castro (twice) and I think it is far more accurate to describe Castro as a know-it-all than as an intelligent man.
The author of the biography, an American professor named Quick, cited many cases where Castro read a book on some subject and then immediately deemed himself an expert on that subject. For instance, if he read a book on some aspect of agriculture, he immediately considered himself an expert on agriculture. The author cites an incident in which a group of Canadian experts in cattle breeding are shown a Cuban institute for cattle breeding. The tour is given by none other than Castro himself, who proceeds to explain the details of how this institute will operate to breed superior cattle. At the end of his lecture, Castro looks to the Canadian breeders and asks, in effect, “So, what do you guys think?”, clearly expecting their high praise. Instead, the Canadian breeders dismiss the methodology of the experiment as preposterous and doomed to failure. What the Canadians didn’t realize is that Castro himself had worked out that methodology!
In short, while Castro has always read a lot, he is really more of a dilettante than an intelligent man. He seems to think you can become an expert in a field by reading a single book on that field and then make major changes to policy on the basis of what you’ve learned in that book. He doesn’t seem to realize that a really intelligent man would read widely in a field before attempting to claim any real familiarity with that field. And even that isn’t enough to claim real expertise: you need to work in the field and DO THINGS in that field – successfully – before you can hope to be considered an expert.
Castro’s key problem is his massive conceit. He seems to think he knows everything and is an expert in everything. That’s why he gets involved in things like cattle breeding in a very active way.
The Castro biography cites another incident where a farmer in a remote part of Cuba is undecided about what to plant in a particular field and somehow word gets back to Castro. Castro immediately hopped into a jeep, drove many hours to get to the farmer, and proceeded to advise him on what he should be planting. That’s pretty silly, in my opinion. Castro’s only formal training is as a lawyer.
I think it is far more accurate to describe Castro as a know-it-all than as an intelligent man…In short, while Castro has always read a lot, he is really more of a dilettante than an intelligent man. He seems to think you can become an expert in a field by reading a single book on that field and then make major changes to policy on the basis of what you’ve learned in that book.. Castro’s key problem is his massive conceit. He seems to think he knows everything and is an expert in everything.
Point taken. You expressed it better than I did.
Perhaps the best example of that is milk production in Cuba.Wikipedia gives a good summary of Ubre Blanca, the wonder cow of Cuba.
Here is the reality of milk production in Cuba after a half century of Fidel. Percentage increases in milk production from 1961 to 2007. [FAO statistics, taken November 2009]
[FAO statistics, taken November 2009, so some of the percentages may have changed.]
Bring back Ubre Blanca!
Perhaps upon his deathbed Castro seeks to get in God’s good graces and admit that Communism was an error and that the Jews have been persecuted far longer than any ethnic group on Earth (even at his own hand). Perhaps.
Who knows what an aging mind does to an evil man?
Perhaps the vicious relic is having a change of heart after witnessing the spectacle of Obama and the farce being played out in American under the “progressivism” of this administration. Hey, what’s next? Fidel hosting a Tea party?
At the very least, the Stalinoid Castrophiliacs are going to be disturbed; at the worst the will feel betrayed. If they are left with the North Korean model it’s gong to be a hard sell.
Another Leninist discovers that Mussolini has the correct model of collectivist organization.
“The Cuban model doesn’t even work for us any more.”
the Cuban model never worked for Cubans.
just the leaders benefited. castro is still a murderous thug.
I will wait to see if he says killing all those thousands of people was a mistake.
Hard to know what to make of this. Fidel may be adjusting the hem on the skirt of his legacy.
But, the undertones should rock Leftist World like a sky raining nuclear missiles. Because I read it thusly:
It is ok to be rabidly anti-American. It is even ok to beat up on Israel a little. But climbing into bed with radicals, just because they share your willingness to blood libel Israel and America, isn’t the smartest ploy in the book.
In a scene from Godfather II, Michael hesitates to do the Havana deal with Lee Strasburg’s Hyman Roth, because he sees a rebel blow himself up, while taking out the Commandante, while being arrested. A suicide bomber mentality can’t be reasoned with and is nearly impossible to prevent or put down.
Who “owns” the suicide bomber mentality in this world of ours? In spades.
Fidel’s undertone message is to leftists. It’s fine and dandy to blood libel Israel and America. Just make sure you don’t get too cozy with the enemy of your enemy. He may not be your friend, as you suppose.
The Journolistas will not take this interpretation. It doesn’t fit their narrative. Ahmadinejad will not be swayed or moved. Fidel’s warning will go unheeded…and his words will be used to promote a kinder, gentler legacy on him. Nothing more.
The left will not see the error of their ways. They never do.
As the global Left has aligned itself with Islam, some of the communist party publications and websites have reminded the foot soldiers that the alignment is merely one of temporary convenience. One such example occurred back in 2006, when the publisher of “Z” magazine reminded the magazine’s readers that although Communists and Muslims have teamed up to bring the West (specifically America) to its knees, the two groups aren’t actual friends, as both are using each other to bring down a common enemy, and both have the ultimate goal of world domination. She then matter-of-factly explained that upon defeat of America and the West, Communists and Muslims will instantly become mortal enemies, engaged in a generations-long battle-to-end-all-battles to eliminate the other from the face of the Earth. The editorial was written for the benefit of naive Lefty foot soldiers who are so thoroughly indoctrinated in Lefty P.C. propaganda that they see Muslims as warm and fuzzy enlightened progressive fellow travelers who fly around the world on magic carpets and flying unicorn camels to spread peace, joy and social justice to people oppressed by the evil Christian-Capitalist imperial war machine.
Say what you will about Castro, but he’s no fool. It could well be that he’s apprehensive about the regional ascendancy of the Chavez/Islamic totalitarian alliance and the rapidly increasing, though heretofore negligible role of Islam Latin America. And don’t forget, despite having instituted atheism and outlawed the church in Cuba, Castro remains something of a practicing Catholic. We know this because when he was gravely ill and expected to die imminently, he brought in a Catholic priest to administer the Catholic Holy sacrament of Last Rites (ponder that for a second: the man who institutionalized atheism in Cuba is no atheist — when he thought he was dying, he wanted to ensure his good standing with the very God whose grace he denies his people — Castro was so concerned about the prospects of his own soul in the next world that he sought out a representative of the church to stack the deck in his favor, yet he prevents his Cuban subjects from the benefit of such soul-saving). It could be that Castro is no fan of Islam, and that he believes America and the West to be more or less defeated (with America now under some approximation of the socialist umbrella and on a collision course with insolvency), and now sees the alliance between Islamic totalitarianism and the Latin American Left as a bigger threat than America and the West.
Ultimately, your guess is as good as any (and perhaps better than most).
Shana Tova. I did not mean to post during the High Holy Days but this article made me do it. This is heartening to read. Yesterday I happened on a link to a woman in NZ who claims to have been unjustly hospitalized by authorities there. She claims it was because of her opposition to the official version of 911 events. Though she sounds like a nice lady, her blog spawned the usual number of vile Jew-haters who claimed that her travails were at the hands of the Masons, The Jews and Israel.
How is this relevant to Castro? Because he has, perhaps, seen where leftism and totalitarianism leads. Perhaps. He is expiating his guilt; perhaps. His last name is associated with ‘Marranos’ – Jews who were forced to convert to Catholicism in the days of the Inquisition. I would guess that Fidel is aware of his origins. Similar origins may help explain why Franco allowed Jewish refugees into Spain, as ‘Franco’ is another Spanish name linked to Jews coerced into abandoning their heritage. I won’t expect Castro to be fasting on Yom Kippur, but I am grateful that he said these words – and I expect the ‘anti-Zionists’ to now tear him apart. Jew-hatred, as Castro stated or implied, is the most fearsome and vile of all.
Isn’t there a saying in Hollywood which effectively states that “everybody becomes more Jewish (culturally, of course) when they go to Hollywood, even if they’re not actually Jewish” (see Ciccone, Madonna and Moore, Demi)?
Maybe all the recent Hollywood adulation for Fidel, and the corresponding access to Hollywood insiders and A-Listers, has rubbed off on him.
You could go from one end of that island to the other and be hard pressed to find one person who could tell you one mistake Fidel has ever made. For that matter, the same is true for the adoring left in the US. Absolutely every bad thing in the last 50 years is attributed to the US or “counter-revolutionary” (counter-Fidel) influences. He holds the world record as a leader with 50 years of correct policies and decisions. Like other totalitarian regimes, there is no one to replace the Great Dear Leader. There’s no opposition party, nor any media competition and thus no motivation or incentive for anyone to ever challenge the “line” as given by Fidel through the party. The significance of these revisions is that it gives permission and space for the Cuban people to rethink some old prejudices about the Jews and about the role of the state in the economy. After 50 years, we have to concede that he has come up with at least two good ideas.
“Another Leninist discovers that Mussolini has the correct model of collectivist organization.”
Thread-winner!
“You can’t teach an old dog new tricks”. This is just circus and entertainment in his constant effort to remain in power. Him and his system don’t produce anything. This dinosaur in green olive suit needs hard currency to survive. He is putting a show for the audience of leftist indecent idiots eager to invest in Cuba regardless the brutality of his 51 years old dictatorship.
From James Taranto:
“Castro took power in Cuba more than 50 years ago. One wonders how many decades it will take Barack Obama to reach a similar realization.”
Never, from the looks of things.
Follow the money.
Interesting. Wasn’t it on a trip to Cuba with a fellow academic Fellow Traveler that the author, Mr. Radosh, had his eyes opened and began to become disabused of his affinity for Cuban-style communism (and ultimately, communism in general)?
And now, Cuban-style communism may have done the same for El Comandante himself!
Un-f*&#ing-believable, if true!
Castro was urging the Russians to nuke the U.S.? Why, to ensure that his island would be incinerated? But it does make for some nice parallels: the Cubans urging Russia to attack the U.S., while JFK’s military advisors were urging him to attack Cuba. As for Castro’s economic revisionism, I think he’s just jealous of Communist China.
As for Castro’s economic revisionism, I think he’s just jealous of Communist China.
Indeed, notice he only admitted that Cuba’s model doesn’t work anymore. He said nothing about it being any better or worse than the American model. I wonder if this isn’t just an attempt to set the stage for an eventual Havana-Beijing partnership to replace the old Havana-Moscow one.
Why did Castro want the Soviets to nuke the US? Well, a few words on the context may be in order since they may help answer the question or at least limit the reasonable theories. It’s been a few years since I read it and I was never able to find it again after I located it the first time, but I seem to recall that his communication with the Soviet Union about nuking the US occurred AFTER the naval blockade had worked and the Soviets turned their ships around to return to the Soviet Union. Despite the fact that those ships turned around, the Soviets had already established a few launch sites that were fully operational and equipped with missiles that were aimed at the US. All sites were under Soviet control but groups of Cuban activists were standing very close by. Although the naval blockade had worked, the US was still doing flyovers in Cuban airspace and I believe that Castro still expected/feared that the US might still take offensive military action against Cuba. I’m not sure precisely what sort of action he feared/expected but this is the context in which he made his remarks encouraging (almost BEGGING) the Soviets to nuke the US: “If the US _does_ attack, please nuke them!”
As I said, I may have some of this wrong so I would greatly welcome any corrections.
The failure of the long-standing US isolationist foreign policy toward Cuba has given Castro all the excuse he has needed to explain the failures of his own policies. As long as he could ascribe his failures to US policy, he succeeded in keeping the Cuban people ‘a huevo’ and maintaining the socialist chimera.
The Castro model for delecting blame has been adopted by the islamic world in its effort to blame the pervasive backwardeness shrouding the Middle East on Israel.
If Fidel coud have licensed his model of deflecting responsibility for failure and exported it for money, he’d have had Cuba prosperous long ago.
http://www.abc.es/20100910/internacional/castro-recula-201009101901.html
He says , he did not said it
jcm: Thanks for the link. I hope that Jeffrey Goldberg has the original tapes of the conversation with Fidel, a.k.a. monologue #56,531. It could have been poor translation. OTOH, he could have actually said it. Then Fidel could plead senility. Or malfunctioning of the recording device!
But the only denial there is about his alleged statement about the Cuban system not working. Fidel claims that he said the capitalist system wasn’t working.
There was no denial whatsoever about what Fidel had been quoted about saying concerning the Jews.So, that appears to stand.
Some commenters at Devil’s Excrement Blog in Venezuela think that Fidel’s statements about the Jews are just campaign fodder for the September 26 legislative elections in Venezuela. See? Hugo isn’t that crazy. Hugo has also recently made some conciliatory statement about Jews, in contrast with his past acts and statements, so Chavez and Castro are in line here. Which should be no surprise.
What a revelation! An old Communist finally acknowledges that Communism has failed in Cuba and that after five hours of interviewing, his unfortunately his Depends are also failing.c