Castro dies of natural causes under questionable circumstances. His brother Raul is still in control of the apparatus. An enormous funeral and wake is observed throughout the nation, but within days after the wake, Cubans begin to demonstrate openly against the post-Castro regime. Raul accelerates liberalizing policies and carefully consolidates preferential property rights for the Cuban Communist Party, including ownership of information systems and key foreign currency owners such as tourist hotels. This cynical abandonment of the revolution in favor of privileged survival is transparent to lower-ranking bureaucrats and outer-circle rivals. Violence breaks out between major institutions with historic grudges, and the competition is fueled as exile leaders and money are attracted to the fray. Leverage is soon applied to change migration, investment, banking and property ownership policies. Once this happens, the regime loses effective political control.
The above referenced quote is a scenario presented in a special issue of Military Review dedicated to Operations other than War published in January 1994.
Lt. Colonel Geoffrey Demarest, U.S. Army proposes several plausible events where “the form and degree of possible Army involvement depend on the character of the scenario of the last days of the Castro regime,” in his article entitled: “The Cuban Contingency”.
Even though the article was written sixteen years ago, several variables (e.g. asphyxiating economic crisis Raul Castro regime is currently confronting) remain ever-present for U.S. military planners in responding to a possible post-Castro collapse.
The lieutenant colonel wrote a follow-up article “Cuba’s Transition,” also published in Military Review in 2001.
Demarest postulates:
[We must] anticipate the entire range and character of potential Army responsibilities [that would be generated by a Cuban political collapse]…The Army probably needs to accelerate its review of officer training emphasis for operations other than war…it should continue to consider more creative force structure possibilities and…stimulate interest in coalition civil-military training and cooperation.
A post collapse Cuban immigration could be many times larger than the Mariel immigration of 1980 and may include individuals whose criminal extradition could be later sought by a post-Castro government. If there is to be a change in Cuban immigration status, it will be directly important to the Army since it will, to a great degree, determine the completion of Army participation in this mission.
He also suggests possible activities in which the U.S. Army might participate after a Cuban political collapse:
- Refugee reception, control and processing.
- Ecological cleanup, Public health management.
- Security of key installations, notably former military bases.
- Prison management and inventory.
- Control and recovery of small arms.
- Inventory/disposition of major weapon systems.
- Mapping support.
- Formation or reformation of public forces.
- Restoration of domestic order, police operations.
- Establishment and enforcement of interim landlord-tenant rules.
- Regularization of real property dispositions.
- Provision of basic services.
- Physical infrastructure replacement.
- Protection of US citizens.
- Resistance to criminal organizing (probable counterdrug emphasis).
- Control of counterfeiting.
- Self-protection security operations.
- Temporary reinforcement of Guantanamo Bay’s perimeter.
- Peacekeeping/peace enforcement/conflict resolution/war termination.
- Counterguerrilla operations.
- Graves registration.
(Few of the above tasks would be U.S Army-specific; most would involve Army support of other agencies in the form technical expertise, man power and equipment).
Lt. Colonel Demarest concludes with this observation: Castro’s revolution may survive for many more years, or Cuba may exit its communist revolutionary experience with an anticlimactic whimper. On the other hand, considerable evidence suggests that Cuba could become a larger challenge for the U.S. Army than Somalia, Kurdistan and Panama combined.