The latest Latell Report has been published:

During a meeting in May, 1966 with Herbert Matthews, his favorite and most pliable American journalist, Fidel Castro confided that the period immediately following his demise “would be the most difficult.”

Matthews’s unpublished notes of the conversation, archived at Columbia University, show that Castro believed the “difficulties” he euphemistically referred to “would be overcome” and that Cuba “would settle down.” He was concerned that his successors would not be able to maintain stability in his absence, perhaps that his brother Raul’s legitimacy was insufficient to smoothly consolidate a successor regime, and ultimately, that there could be instability and violence. But indirectly he also expressed confidence that the Cuban military would restore order and that his revolution would go forward without him.

Today, more than forty years later, the same concerns are on the minds of Cuban leaders. In the fourteen months since Castros partial abdication no uprisings or challenges to his brothers authority have been reported. Yet, the two key variables that were at the heart of Fidel’s rumination with Matthews the reliability of the uniformed services and the depth of popular support for the regime are still the most crucial ones.

Once Fidel Castro’s iron grip finally is released, his successors are not sure what might occur in the streets, even though most Cubans by now are prepared for the announcement of his death. Popular expectations for liberalizing change already are high, especially among the youth, although little of consequence has been achieved thus far in their behalf. Given their frustrations and the hardships they endure, it is possible that spontaneous demonstrations could occur following the announcement of Castros death. Certainly the regime is concerned about that possibility.

In late July and August, 2006 following the announcement of Castro’s “provisional” abdication the regime took elaborate security precautions. Similar, stringent measures are sure to be implemented again before his death is announced. Security and military forces, including elite military units, will be mobilized and dispersed to potential trouble spots. Undercover intelligence and police will be put on high alert, and preventive detentions and intensified surveillance of dissidents and others will be likely.

Such precautions will be maintained for an extended period. Fidel Castro’s successors will not take any chances as they make preparations for the funeral observances that will attract large numbers of international dignitaries and media. With so many foreign witnesses and international film crews present, any evidence of popular unrest would undermine the legitimacy of the successor regime and could do lasting damage.

Whether Fidel Castro actually believed it or not in 1966, he spoke confidently to Matthews of the revolutions support with the populace. Always Fidel’s faithful scribe, Matthews said he “spoke with immense enthusiasm of the fervor of the people” for the revolution. “It has really got hold of them.” After all, Castro is said to have pontificated, “This is the only way we can make and sustain a revolution. Its basis has to be in the people.”

Certainly Castro, or Matthews, or both, were exaggerating the regimes popular support at that time. Their conversation took place not many months after the Camarioca refugee sealift, the initiation of the Freedom Flights from Varadero, and the installation of the leadership cadre of the new fidelista communist party. Popular discontent was widespread. Rivalries and policy disputes within the leadership were intense. Major purges had recently occurred and others would follow.

Today the regime probably enjoys even less popular support than it did in 1966, and perhaps less than at any time since its inception. The Castro brothers and other leaders have openly acknowledged the dangerously profound alienation of Cuba’s youth. Despite the transitional regimes efforts to engage and assuage the under thirty-five “Lost Generation,” tensions seem certain to increase.

Instability could take many forms depending on how those conditions were first ignited. At the lowest end of the spectrum isolated popular disturbances in one or a few urban areas –sparked either by economic or political triggers– might prove to be relatively easily and bloodlessly contained by the police and security forces.

Even then Cuban leaders would probably seek to ameliorate the underlying animosities by enacting targeted reforms. Leaders will be intent on preventing all forms of civil disobedience and disturbances, however, fearing that once underway they could spiral out of control. But under conditions of sustained popular unrest the regime could be faced for the first time since the early and mid-1960s with an opposition that might begin to coalesce.

Fidel Castro’s successors would be uncertain and probably divided about how to respond to such challenges. Without the implacable Fidel to order merciless crackdowns and military campaigns to eradicate all opposition, his successors would probably experiment with different means of reducing or co-opting opposition elements. Moderates in Raul’s circle would advocate negotiations and concessions to pacify a rising opposition. Hardliners, also in his entourage, would demand to do what Fidel would, by brutally extinguishing all enemies of the old order. Their different strategies and priorities would in all likelihood generate discord and possibly open conflict.

As always, the armed forces will be the key. The generals will be loath to order bloody repression of civilians in public places, and at least some officers would be likely to refuse orders to do so. In such a crisis atmosphere, generals could force change at the top almost at will, even to the extent of backing a rival to Raul or his eventual successor. Though both possibilities are unlikely now, the generals will remain more powerful than any conceivable combination of civilian leaders, that is, as long as command and control in their ranks remains steadfast.

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Phil Peters of the Lexington Institute poses the question: Will Raul Castro Reform Cuba’s Economy?

Talk to anyone who worked with Raul Castro, or anyone clued in to the process that produced Cuba’s economic reforms in the early 1990’s, and you get the same story: that he supported those reforms and is not averse to the use of market mechanisms to improve Cuba’s economy. 

But with his brother in power, we could never know Raul’s preference for Cuban economic policy if he were in charge.

That may soon change. 

Fidel Castro has not appeared in public for more than a year, and in the video released last week he doesn’t appear capable of taking back the reins of executive power that he delegated in July 2006.

With Raul Castro now serving as interim chief executive, Cuba is engaged in an economic policy debate of potentially great consequence. 

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Today’s Chicago Tribune has an article about Cubans’ limited access to the Internet:

 At a government-run Internet cafe inside a Havana post office, the 1,942 Cubans signed up to use the computers were left with a question this summer: Why had the government abruptly cut their Internet access, leaving them only with e-mail on a state account?  At this and three other public centers in Havana no longer on the Web, managers and clientele could only speculate why: Did demand exceed the woeful infrastructure?  Or was it the latest example of information control in the communist nation, as Internet rumors abound about Fidel Castro’s illness and prognosis?  Did the communications minister make good on a February pronouncement that the Internet “can and must be controlled”?  “They don’t want us to see the critical press,” one man said.  “They want to keep us in darkness,” said another, adding that his e-mails can be more easily monitored.  Not even two employees at the post office knew why they lost Web surfing in early July.  “I don’t think there should be any limitations because it’s not good for cultural advancement,” one manager said.

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Via Daily Mail:

Fidel Castro has made his first TV appearance in more than three months, scotching speculation that his death had been covered up by Cuban officials.  Rumours of the 81-year-old leader’s demise have been swirling since he missed his birthday celebrations in August.  However, he seemed determined to put paid to them in the interview, casually mentioning the current price of oil and the exchange rate between the dollar and the euro.  He also showed a copy of a book by former U.S. Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, which has just been published.

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James Petras (a retired Bartle Professor Emeritus of Sociology at Binghamton University, SUNY) analyzes from a Marxist perspective the pressing problems (from agricultural production to housing) facing the post-Fidel government of Cuba headed by successor Army General Raul Castro.

Among his points:

Cuba’s agricultural production is directed, in large part, toward the tourist and export market: tobacco, citrus, tropical fruit, sugar (barely); much of the quality fruit, meat, produce and poultry is sold in the private ‘farmers’ markets, or in the special stores which trade in dollars or ‘convertible’ currency. As a result, there is a scarcity of products at the state-subsidized neighborhood stores. The development of ‘urban gardens’ has been one solution for certain neighborhoods – providing fresh quality ‘organic’ produce – but fail to cover much of the
population’s needs.

[…]

While Cuba has effectively channeled large-scale capital investments into tourism, biotechnology and other productive sectors, it has neglected its housing sector creating a 10-year waiting list for over a million families. The housing deficit is one of the major sources of discontent among the Cuban people, even among its mid-level party and government officials, who have to live with their in-laws. In addition, current housing is in great disrepair, especially pronounced in Central ‘Old’ Havana, where even low cost paint and plaster could re-vitalize working class neighborhoods – now so badly deteriorated.

[…]

Low wages, weak motivation, lack of work discipline, low productivity is a cycle that has affected services, manufacturing and agricultures in a vicious cycle, which can be converted into a virtuous cycle. Over the past three years, wages were unfrozen after almost two decades and some relatively substantial increases were granted. Yet relative to the substantial increases in charges for home electricity use, food (a substantial proportion of which is purchased in the ‘free’ market), clothing and other necessities, the pay increases are below what is necessary to stimulate
greater productivity.

Full text, click here.

(H/T: La Nueva Cuba)

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Simon Romero of the New York Times writes about Colombia’s Marxist rebel group National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional — ELN) and the refuge that Cuba has and is providing:

Dinner with the guerrillas was a civilized affair. A chauffeured Mercedes, courtesy of Cuba’s government, delivered guests to the villa where the leaders of one of Colombia’s most resilient rebel groups often stay when they are in town.

Francisco Galán, a former seminarian with a long white beard, poured glasses of Añejo de Caldas rum and distributed cigarettes from a pack of Marlboro Lights. Before sitting down to a meal of red snapper, a treat commonly reserved for visitors with hard currency, Pablo Beltrán, the lead negotiator for the National Liberation Army, or E.L.N., offered a toast: “To Cuba.”

To Cuba: a fitting tribute to a nation that nurtured the insurgency from its origins here in the 1960s and has since become something of a refuge for the aging rebels, who occasionally come here for medical care.

It is also, paradoxically, the place where the revolutionaries are trying to peacefully end their movement after decades of violent struggle against a string of pro-American governments. This is one of the only places where the E.L.N. feels safe enough to engage in cease-fire talks with Colombia’s government.

Full text here.

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From The Economist print edition:

FOR the past few weeks Miami has been gripped by rumours that Fidel Castro, Cuba’s sick communist president, may be dead. One factor fuelling the fire is that Cuban officials insist that his health is a state secret, though they also say he continues to recover from intestinal surgery. Another is that no new images of Mr Castro were issued on his 81st birthday last month. Then there is the deep-rooted belief among his opponents that the death of the Líder Máximo will be covered up.

It would not be the first time. El Cid, Spain’s quasi-fictional hero of the Reconquista, is alleged to have carried on fighting after his death, his body strapped to his horse to terrify his Moorish opponents. China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, died on a journey in 210BC, but the news was kept quiet for two months until his entourage had safely returned to the capital. The death of Edward VI, a young English king, was disguised during several days of scheming over his succession. Tibetan leaders managed to hide the death of the fifth Dalai Lama for no fewer than 15 years.

But cover-ups have got much harder. Not even the sudden and destabilising death of Joseph Stalin or the expected demises of Josip Broz Tito, Leonid Brezhnev or Kim Il Sung were hushed up for long. To hide the death of a dictator, one of his sidekicks needs to have both privileged access to information and the strength to suppress its leakage. But any such person is an obvious successor and thus has little interest in concealment.

Nonsense, say the conspiracy theorists in Miami. They point to the cases of Spain’s General Francisco Franco and Mao Zedong, both of whose deaths were revealed on suspiciously symbolic dates (the anniversary of Japan’s surrender to China, in Mao’s case). So just before October 10th, the date of Cuba’s declaration of independence from Spain in 1868, expect another wave of rumours in Miami that Mr Castro has passed away.

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