Now is the time of merited celebrations of the re-establishment of diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States and the re-opening of their respective embassies on the already historic July 20th. Millions of us have shared the emotion as the single-star flag was raised in Washington by foreign minister Bruno Rodriguez and three soldiers of the homeland.

We should not begrudge due recognition to President Barak Obama for his brave rupture from the aggressive routine of more than half a century and the beginning of a civilized dialogue, with fuller respect for the sovereignty of Cuba. It is time to proclaim that without the heroic resistance of the Cuban people, the wise leadership of Fidel and Raúl and the demand of all of Latin America and the Caribbean, this favourable outcome would not have been possible. We must also thank those popular, religious, political and business groups that have rowed against the current in the United States to reach this point. We must also acknowledge Russia and China for their friendship and solidarity with Cuba, as their power grew greater and multi-polarity was consolidated; along with all the governments that, for 17 years, have voted against the blockade in the UN.

But it is also time not to forget the historical context that gave rise to the existing disagreements between the two countries, some of them insuperable while Cuba waves the socialist flag, that I am sure will continue for the foreseeable future. We must be aware that the conflict between Cuba and the United States did not begin with the Cuban revolution, as some untruthful hegemonic media outlets and counterrevolutionary ideologues affirm, although there is no doubt that after 1959, it took on an intensity beyond what had been seen before.

The historical evidence clearly attests to an aspiration for domination and annexation of the island by the bourgeois classes of the 13 colonies, well before the American Revolution (1776). This is so much so, that after the occupation of Havana by the English (1762), those most strongly opposed to the withdrawal of the English were the big businessmen of the colonies of the North, whose prosperity largely depended on the trade in rum and molasses, so abundant in Cuba.  They had therefore contributed hundreds of men who joined the British troops to invade the Cuban capital. This tendency was seen in the beginnings of the XIX Century and, above all, after the proclamation of the Monroe Doctrine (1823). From that time on, Washington initiated a number of actions directed towards the annexation of the island that had their clearest expression in the military intervention of 1898, followed by another occupation and numerous interventionist acts that continued until 1959.

With the awareness that in Cuba a real revolution had triumphed, whose leaders, headed by Fidel Castro, were not willing to renounce their independence and sovereignty, the United States broke off diplomatic relations with the island and initiated what can only be called a undeclared war. What else could anyone call a campaign of hundreds of terrorist acts that lasted until recent years, the defeated invasion of the Bay of Pigs, numerous episodes of biological warfare, destabilization plans that still continue, not to mention the on-going blockade, even though President Obama has discretely flexibilized it and requested the Congress to terminate it.

Without this very synthetic account, it is not possible to understand the roots of this bilateral conflict and the nature of both protagonists, in which Washington, which is still expansionist and imperialist, has been the aggressor. The Cuban people, on the contrary, have always acted in defence of their right to independence, sovereignty and self-determination in the face of the neighbour's aggression. Their conduct became even more conscious and combative when the revolutionary government began to take measures to improve the living conditions of their citizens, which necessarily affected interests of the big US corporations and provoked a ferocious hostility on the part of the northern power.

This hostility was not only due to the interests affected by the revolutionary measures, but also to the fear that the example might be followed by other countries of the region that until then had been considered their back yard, and in which they had never permitted nor accepted, up to today, reforms that could modify their dictates. Here we have the example of the sister country, Venezuela.

(Translated for ALAI by Jordan Bishop)
 

Angel Guerra Cabrera: Twitter: @aguerraguerra