Havana Times on luxurious apartments in Havana built for high-ranking officers of the Cuban Army (Ejército Revolucionario) and the MININT (Ministry of the Interior—State Security) in stark contrast with housing units constructed a few miles away in the capital’s community of San Agustin.
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In the last couple of weeks there has been an increase in the intensity of repression by the MININT (Ministry of Interior) in the eastern zone of the island, especially against young members of dissident group, Eastern Democratic Alliance (Alianza Democrática Oriental). [Martí Noticias]
Tags: Alianza Democrática Oriental, Eastern Democratic Alliance, MININT
Civil Defense Chief Division General Ramón Pardo Guerra, who arrived in Moscow last Sunday, met with Russian Minister of Emergency Situation Serguei Shoigu and attended today the inauguration ceremony of the 2010 Intergrated Safety and Security Exhibition (ISSE) fair at the All-Russia Exhibition Center in Moscow, reports Cuban state media.
Fair exhibits include Fire Protection, Rescue Equipment, Security Technical Systems and Equipment, Transport Safety, Armament and Technical Equipment of Special Forces Units, Industrial Safety, Technical Facilities for Border and Customs Control, Equipment for Nuclear, Chemical and Biological Safety, Information and Communication Security.
Of particular interest to the Cuban FAR (Revolutionary Armed Forces) and MININT (Ministry of Interior) would be the Armament and Technical Equipment of Special Forces Units exhibit for the potential use of new technologies to enforce stability operations in Havana that would provide security for the regime.
Organizers of the exhibition are a who’s who of Russian Federation security ministries: Ministry of the Russian Federation for Civil defense, Emergencies and Elimination of Consequences of Natural Disasters (EMERCOM), Ministry of the Interior of the Russian Federation, Boarder Service of the Russian Federation Security Service, Federal Service of Military-Tecnical Cooperation, Russian Defense Export State Corporation.
The delegation that came along with DG Pardo Guerra will visit The National Bureau of Situations of Crisis in Russia on Wednesday and on Thursday Cuban guests will tour the Ministry of the Russian Federation for Civil defense, Emergencies and Elimination of Consequences of Natural Disasters (EMERCOM).
DG Pardo Guerra and his delegation will watch EMERCOM forces demonstration exercises in Noguinsk city, which is the closing program of the International Security Hall 2010 on Friday, May 21.
The goal of ISSE “is to provide effective cooperation between executive authorities and manufacturers of safety and security products in order to promote up-to-date technologies both to domestic and foreign markets of security systems and equipment.”
Tags: Academy of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, All-Russia Exhibition Center, EMERCOM, FAR, Intergrated Safety and Security Exhibition, ISSE, MININT, Ministry of Interior, National Bureau of Situations of Crisis, Ramon Pardo Guerra, Revolutionary Armed Forces, Russian Minister of Emergency Situation
Carlos Ominami. Image: The Clinic
Former Chilean leftist Senator Carlos Ominami (whose adoptive son is Marco Enríquez-Ominami, a Socialist who ran as an independent in the recent Chilean presidential election supported by Max Marambio) said the distancing of the Cuban regime with businessman Max Marambio (background here and here) is due to a “settling of scores” after the departure of Fidel Castro from power, in an interview he gave to The Clinic.
Ominami adds: ”I think what happened to Max (Marambio) falls within the same process that took as its latest victims Carlos Lage, Felipe Perez Roque and Gustavo Ramirez and (Rogelio) Acevedo, who is none other than the last living guerrilla with Che in the Sierra Maestra.”
He goes on further to say:
I think there are political reasons for the settling of scores. Fidel and Raul are not going to fight ever because they know that the minute they do, the Cuban revolution collapses. But they have allowed the existence of political power subsystems that will. And it is clear there are two lines: the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR) and Ministry of Interior (MININT). In Cuba, both institutional leaderships have troops and those troops have rivalries. MININT Special Troops have rivalries with the FAR and finally what you’re experiencing is a history of that conflict.
[H/T: La Nueva Cuba]
Tags: Carlos Lage, Carlos Ominami, Cuban regime, FAR, Felipe Perez Roque, Fidel Castro, Gustavo Ramirez, Marco Enríquez-Ominami, Max Marambio, MININT, Ministry of Interior, Revolutionary Armed Forces, Rogelio Acevedo
Division General Leonardo Andollo Valdés (Deputy Chief, General Staff) announced for the first time on Cuban state television that the Cuban military prepares for internal warfare against the people.
The War of All the People (Guerra de todo el pueblo) has been the fundamental underpinning of the Cuban armed forces’ military doctrine where the social masses are responsible for the national defense of the country against potential U.S. agression.
However, with Bastion 2009, that fundamental is evolving for the first time to include for the preparation of the armed forces’ internal war against the people.
La Jornada reports Division General Leonardo Andollo Valdés’ (Deputy Chief, General Staff) comments on the Mesa Redonda (Round Table) state television program surrounding the FAR and MININT’s military exercises beginning today.
Div. Gen. Andollo stated that the military maneuvers “begin in a situation of peacetime” and are in preparation for “the increase of enemy subversive activity aimed at causing social disorder and ungovernability in Cuba.”
Was this a slip of the tongue for Andollo or was he sanctioned by the military hierarchy to make it abundantly clear for internal/external consumption the government’s plan to crush, without hesitation, social instability affecting internal security?
The economic implosion (e.g. energy crisis, falling exports, limited capital inflow, eliminating food rationing booklet) the Cuban government faces caused by a stagnate command economy with meager traces of capitalism is propelling an inevitable social upheaval that the military and security forces will confront.
Bastion 2009 exercises are further evidence of such a fundamental change to the military’s mission to now quash social instability which has been publicly announced by a high-ranking general of the Cuban military’s high command.
Tags: Bastion 2009, Cuban military, FAR, internal warfare, Leonardo Andollo Valdes, Military, MINFAR, MININT, Revolutionary Armed Forces, social disorder in Cuba, ungovernability in Cuba
Assessment
The collapse of the Soviet Union has deprived the Cuban Army of its major economic and logistic support, and has had a significant impact on equipment numbers and serviceability. The army remains well trained and professional in nature, and is likely to have adopted previous doctrine to take into account the current shortcomings in the quality and quantity of equipment held. While the lack of replacement parts for its existing equipment and the current severe shortage of fuel have increasingly affected its operational capability and may continue to do so on some scale, Cuba remains able to offer considerable resistance to any regional power, including the United States. The international political environment, the country’s economic plight and Castro’s own conclusions about his Cold War interventions abroad, have limited Cuba’s efforts to export Marxist revolution. A new relationship with oil rich Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has translated into a recent boost in operational readiness, mainly due to oil credits and donations. So far this has not translated into a formal re-surge in Cuban military prowess, but Cuban instructors and doctrine is bound to penetrate the new ALBA member’s armed forces (Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia). However, most of Cuba’s foreign serving personnel are doctors. As in other Latin American countries, the army is the dominant service even though the FAR suffers from less interservice rivalry than most armed services in the region. There are three major geographical commands: Cuantos, Comandos, and Geogr
Tags: army, Army Corps General , Army Corps General Ram, Basti, counter-intelligence, Cuban armed forces, Cuban intelligence, Cuban military, Cuban security forces, Eastern Army, Ej, Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias, General Ramon Espinosa, General Staff, Government, Julio Casas Regueiro, Leopoldo Cintra Fr, Military, Military Counter-Intelligence, Military Industries Union, military officers, MINFAR, MININT, Ministry of Interior, Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces, MTT, Navy, Raul Castro, Revolutionary War Navy, Special Troops, War of All the People, Western Army
Colonel Alex Crowther (Research Professor of National Security Studies in the Strategic Studies Institue of the US Army War College) has penned an editorial on Cuba, Raul and the military. He is also the author of Security Requirements for Post-Transition Cuba.
As Louis XV allegedly said, “Apres moi, le deluge.” Certainly people have thought that Cuba after Fidel would be the same. How would a Cuban state that revolves around him survive his departure? How would a government where no decision is too small for his attention function? How would the generations who have known no one other than the “Maximo Lider” handle the change? Luckily for the Cuban government, the answer is
Tags: Carlos Lage, Council of Ministers, Council of State, Cuban Communist Party, FAR, Fidel Castro, MINFAR, MININT, Ministry of the Interior, National Assembly, Raul Castro, Revolutionary Armed Forces
Pinar del Rio
- PEDRO MIGUEL P
Tags: army, Civil Defense, FAR, Military Counter-Intelligence, Military Industries Union, MINFAR, MININT, Ministry of Interior, Navy
Cuba’s Eastern Army (Ej
Tags: Army Corps General , Army Corps General Ram, Eastern Army, FAR, General Staff, MININT, Ministry of Interior, Revolutionary Armed Forces
Wired Magazine has published an article that addresses the painstakingly process of reconstructing torn surveillance files by hand of the Stasi (East Germany’s State Security Service), which had an influence over its tropical version–Cuba’s Ministry of Interior (MININT).
Will the MININT follow suit in tearing up files once the Castro regime is no longer in power?
A snippet of the article is as follows:
Because before it was disbanded, the Stasi shredded or ripped up about 5 percent of its files. That might not sound like much, but the agency had generated perhaps more paper than any other bureaucracy in history
Tags: Cuban intelligence, Department of State Security, DGI, Directorate of Intelligence (DI), MININT, Ministry of Interior, Security, Stasi
Chris Simmons, a career counterintelligence officer and an expert on Cuban intelligence has written the following article on the Iran-Cuba nexus published in the Miami Herald:
Scott Carmichael, a senior counterintelligence officer with the Defense Intelligence Agency, recently confirmed continued intelligence sharing between Iran and Cuba. Additionally, Israeli sources report that during last year’s meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement in Havana, Iranian and Cuban intelligence officers discussed increased collaboration in targeting the United States.
Close ties between Tehran and Havana have reportedly existed since Iran’s revolutionary leadership came to power in 1979. Given both nations’ sponsorship of terrorism, their continued collaboration imperils U.S. national security. In the past, Havana provided training and material to selected terrorist groups, some of which are Iranian allies. Today, Cuba remains a safe haven for some international terrorist groups and it allows safe transit to others. Furthermore, Iran’s Interests Section and its Mission to the United Nations appear inadequately staffed for significant intelligence collection. This shortfall likely makes Tehran even more dependent on Havana’s continued intelligence trafficking.
In 2006, Ricardo Cabrisas Ruiz — a career officer in Cuba’s premier foreign intelligence service, the Directorate of Intelligence (DI) — visited with senior Iranian government officials. This meeting followed his October 2003 meeting with President Mohammad Khatami on expanded ties between Havana and Tehran.
At the time, Cabrisas served under cover as a minister without portfolio. During their discussions, Khatami said reciprocal visits by officials of the two countries would lead to further expansion and consolidation of mutual ties. Khatami described his nation’s ties with Havana as exemplary and claimed that closer Cuba-Iran cooperation would benefit the entire world. Cabrisas publicly focused on Havana’s willingness to broaden ties with Tehran and underlined the need to bolster economic cooperation. The meeting called for the recurring visits by officials, scientists and others to develop these enhanced ties.
Since at least 1996, the DI has targeted U.S. technologies beneficial to the Cuban economy. With one of the most advanced biotechnology industries in the emerging world, Castro successfully made biotechnology a building block of the Cuban economy. Cuba now holds more than 400 biotechnology patents and earns considerable foreign currency through its sales of biotechnology products to more than 50 nations. Tehran and Havana first began collaborative work on dual-use biotechnologies in the early 1990s.
Acting on behalf of Tehran, in July 2003, Cuban intelligence jammed the transmissions of the National Iranian Television (NITV), the Voice of America and three other Iran-bound broadcasts. The extended jamming coincided with Tehran’s crackdown on the dissident commemoration of the historic 1999 student uprising.
Loral Skynet, owners of the targeted satellite, quickly traced the source of the jamming to a spot several miles outside of Havana. The location identified was the Cuban military intelligence’s Bejucal Signals Intelligence site, which intercepts and jams radio and television signals with equal ease. NITV first broadcast from its Los Angeles-based station in March 2000. However, Iran promptly jammed the Hot Bird 5 satellite in its static orbit over France.
NITV and other broadcasters then moved to Telstar 12, because its stationary orbit over the mid-Atlantic placed it outside the range of Iran’s jamming stations. However, the move placed NITV within range of Cuba, the only nation in the Western Hemisphere that jams foreign broadcasts. Worldwide, only seven nations engage in such illegal jamming.
Havana had demonstrated Tehran’s importance in May 2001 when Fidel Castro visited Iran. Cuba’s ambassador to Tehran, career DI officer Dar
Tags: Bejucal, Cuban intelligence, Department of State Security, Directorate of Intelligence (DI), Intelligence, Iran, MININT
The Miami Herald reports on East Germany’s notorious Stasi security agency and its influence over the tropical version, Cuba’s Ministry of the Interior (MININT). Jorge Lu
Tags: counter-intelligence, Cuban Communist Party, East Germany, eavesdropping, espionage, Intelligence, MININT, security agency, spying, Stasi, subversion
