[A travelogue to and fro England, November 2-13, 2006]

Born in the world’s mightiest terrorist state, self-exiled in the world’s smallest terrorist state, I am on a mission to the world’s second mightiest terrorist state.

Actually my mission is two-in-one, I think as I sit in a Copenhagen S-tog. I am on the electric train heading to Kastrup airport mulling over this mission. It started with a surprised invitation to speak at a day school on Cuba and Venezuela in Leeds, England. Originally, I was asked to hold the keynote speech on Cuba today: how it is tackling and overcoming many of the economic ands social problems it has had since the fall of its trading partners; its future prospects and solidarity work. The Leeds district of the national Cuba Solidarity Campaign (CSC) invited me based upon reading several of my articles in the left-wing daily, “Morning Star”. I had been its Cuba correspondent in the 1990s, and I had just taken a three-month trip to compare the besieged island-nation with a decade ago.

One of the major debilities the left has long had is its internecine attitudes and actions. This historic psychological-political problem has plagued me during decades of political activity and radical writing whether I am in the United States, Denmark, Latin America or now England.

My political actions and writings are aimed at supporting people, movements and nations which promulgate and create human conditions that actually abolish hunger and poverty, unnecessary suffering and death from sicknesses that can be prevented or cured, from racism and inequality, opposing the capitalist system based upon winners and losers, rich and poor.

Cuba for me is the home of my heart. As I wrote in the “Morning Star” series, “I align myself with the Cuban revolution, with its warts and its valiant efforts to humanize people and be independent” of any power. And precisely because I align myself with this humanitarian system, I find it my duty to portray its warts and work with Cuban brothers and sister to try to remove the warts. Living and working in Cuba for eight years (1988-96) taught me that one cannot be a true friend unless one is honest with those with whom one wishes to be friends.

But the leadership of CSC decided I had “let Cuba down” as Steve Wilkinson, a leading member of the national executive committee and editor of its quarterly “Cuba Si”, wrote in “Morning Star”.

“The butchers in Washington and Miami are sharpening their knives. But, unlike Ron, I firmly believe that the Cubans will show them where to go.”

Steve places me on the side of the capitalist mass media while he and CSC stand for “the opposite of what our media and socialists like Ron have been saying.”

“Who is right? Ron or Fidel?...In Britain, we must work hard to marginalize those who see the glass as empty. Now is the time to unite around the call to help the Cuban people defend their sovereignty. We must not let Cuba down.”

This chronicle was followed up by a letter from CSC’s executive committee telling all its branches to ban me. We “advise groups that [Executive Committee] speakers [are] available and that Ron Ridenour…does not represent the views that CSC wishes to express about respect for Cuban sovereignty and that therefore he should not be invited.”

This attack left me depressed. It impugned my personal integrity, my years of working directly for Cuba’s government and media when I lived there at the Ministry of Culture’s invitation, and my decades long support efforts outside the island. CSC leadership’s “marginalization” of me also caused Leeds to reduce my role to one of leading a work-shop, and another branch to un-invite me as their speaker. Two other branches, Oxford and Southampton, decided to hold fast with their decision to have me speak. Many branches decided not to invite me.

There was quite a debate in the “Morning Star” about whether I was for or against Cuba, were there any problems in Cuba about which one should comment, and what the role of solidarity work should or should not include. Is any critical view healthy or not?

Theodore MacDonald, a professor who has held or holds chairs in health, education, mathematics and physical sciences, who has also written many books including several on Cuba, wrote the following about my writings:

“Ron is not a political theoretician, but his devotion to revolutionary Cuba cannot be doubted. Some of his comments are deeply resonant of comments that you frequently hear Cubans coming out with on building sites. They bespeak a guarded tendency to belittle high ideals with mordantly humorous asides about low-level corruption”—something Theodore also associated with what he heard nuns say among themselves on projects in El Salvador, in the 1970s, a sort of “Let’s not sound so holy”.

“In Ron’s case, it gives his writing the salty bit of authenticity in a Damon Runyan sort of way, but it is obvious that he regards the Cuban Revolution as a pearl of great price.” Ron’s literary style is “much more likely to grab the attention of that great mass of `politically apathetic´ consumers of Fox News than” than more customary solidarity writings.

My mission is to spread knowledge of the tenacious Cuban people, to support and raise efforts in solidarity with Cuba; and, secondarily, show that we are stronger when we embrace our variations, our different styles.

I can face the real enemy with some degree of calm but when I also have to engage in “combat” with leading activists, who truly love and fight for Cuba, my armpits sweat and my mouth is dry.
It is just after noon when I arrive at the airport in this disposition.

Terror war’s terror laws

“Here, sir, read this! The new anti-terror airport rules,” a young man says, sticking a pamphlet before my breast.

I am jostled out of my agonizing reflection and thrust into another.

“No thanks”, I say brusquely.

“Oh, really, that’s too bad because the rules begin next Monday and you must obey them. It’s for your own protection against terrorism.”

“Terrorism! It is your country, your government that is making the aggressive war against the Middle East. And the work you are doing is causing us to be afraid. You are the ones who are terrorizing us all. If you would stop killing people, in order to steal their oil and sovereignty, then there would be no terrorism!”

“No, no. I don’t care to hear that,” he says and walks hurriedly away.

I take a long breath. I need a drink and a smoke. I reach inside my coat. My last joint is still there. I can’t take my naturally grown medicine with me but I must take this last one before I get onto the plane. But first, I must check my bags.

“You must be attentive with your baggage and all personal belongings. They must be beside you at all times. If you leave them unaccompanied, they will be removed and may be destroyed,” blasts over the loud-speakers.

I walk to the line at Sterling, bypassing several more young people pushing papers with new rules onto passengers, who I notice take them without making any comment.

The line is long and I must push my bags beside me at all times. When it is my turn, the woman clerk weighs my bags and asks me questions:

“Have you packed your bags alone?”

Jesus, what if I hadn’t? What if I couldn’t?

“Yes.”

“Have you and only you…”

Her voice fades.

“Yes.”

“Has anyone asked you to take something for them with you?”

“No.”

I must appear glassy-eyed because suddenly I hear a human voice.

“I’m sorry sir, but I must ask you these questions. It is security, you know, but only to London and America.”

Jesus, Che, Ho, give me the strength to endure this so I may bring Cuba’s message to people, so that I may tell them who the real terrorists are.

“Attention all passengers! This is a security announcement! Passengers are required to….”

“If you fail to comply with these requirements, it might endanger your safety while on flight!”

It is me they are speaking of. I am the war-mongers enemy. They are pointing the finger at me. I will be whisked away. Will they torture me, too, or will they just disappear me in some secret cell? But if they do that, they will certainly torture me too. The nightmares I suffer, feeling I am being tortured are going to come true, yet again.

I walk outside and inhale my last joint into my body. My head lightens, my nerves relax slightly.

Now, I need a drink. I’ve got an hour before the plane departs. I order a Tulamore whiskey and take it to a table and roll a cigarette. As I drink and inhale, I search my pockets to make sure I have all I must have with me. Lo, where is my passport? My bags are checked in. I have this small backpack with nothing put papers and books. No passport in pants, shirt, coat! I rush up to the counter and ask an attendant if he saw a passport, a Yankee one. No. He asks another attendant. He looks in the back. After long minutes, he returns with my passport. Oh, thank you!

One more drink. I pee, the sixth time since awakening. Now I must go through security. Back in the great halls, the loudspeakers’ blare their messages of fear. Though my head is lighter, my heart is still throbbing from the near loss of my passport and my arthritic fingers are shaking from the messages of fear.

When it is my turn in the security line, the man tells me to empty all my pockets and place everything in a tray. My coat, sweater and back-pack go through a rolling tunnel. I walk into a door frame. “Take off your belt, sir.” I do so. He searches my body.

“Okay, you may pick up your things now. Have a nice day.”

Jesus, have a nice day? The tray has holes in it and my pen is gone. What is a writer without a pen? But I have foreseen such a mishap and remember I have another in my back-pack. I walk up to a departure bar and order another whiskey. But, of course, one may not smoke while drinking. But, yes, there is an upstairs room filled with smoke. We nervous passengers stand with our drinks and cigarettes inhaling for the last time in hours.

I have a few minutes before boarding, so I walk into a liquor-package store and grab a bottle of bitter. After a wait in line, the clerk places an electronic thing on the bottle and looks at his computer screen.

“I regret to say, sir, but you can’t buy this bottle.”

“What?”

“Not if you are going to stay in London.”

“What? Well, I am not staying in London. I am taking a bus to Oxford from the airport.”

“Well, as long as you are not traveling immediately to another country, you may not buy this bottle. You must step out of line and select a bottle of 32 centimeters that can be taken into England.”

I don’t understand what he means and have no time to make another line. Then he informs me that I can’t drink from any bottle bought on the plane anyway. All liquids must be sealed while flying.

I walk to the boarding gate. We all wait until everyone is assembled and the door is opened and we trudge onto the plane. Scrunched between two obese men, my legs half-bent under the seat before me, I sit as still as I am forced to. My mouth is dry but I can’t have any liquid until the plane is in the air and the stewardess’ come around with their carts. Half-an-hour later, I buy a bottle of water and a small bottle of whiskey. Once that refreshment is gone, I order another. The Danish stewardess picks up my empty and says, “You might as well take the last drop, sir, for reinforcement.”

Ah, a pleasant voice with a friendly suggestion.

The plane lands and we step slowly towards the gangway. Stepping off the plane, the same stewardess smiles and says, “Have a nice day, sir.”

In the original country of democracy, it is a long walk to passport control. I’ve got an hour before the bus leaves for Oxford. Since I still have a US passport—why I couldn’t get a Danish passport is another involved story—I must got to a separate line. I am the only one here. A passport security officer takes my passport and asks me questions; one of them is:

“What will you be doing here, sir?”

“Speaking out,” I reply automatically without thinking diplomatically, something that does not come natural, “trying to help bring about a more peaceful world.”

Silence. He hands me my passport without suggesting that I have a nice day.

I buy a bottle of whiskey and suck on it during the two-and-one-half hour trip to Oxford. The bus is crowded. There are lots of kids, some of them yelling. A boy hits on a girl. Their parents seem oblivious of their irritating behavior.

Caroline picks me up at the designated place. She has copies of my just-published book, “Cuba: Beyond the Crossroads.” It looks attractive and contains what it should, all my “Morning Star” articles with amplification, a preface and Theodore’s introduction. We grab a Guinness and a bite to eat. Although I have had a bit to drink and my last joint, I am not influenced by the drugs. My talk with nine members of the Oxford CSC branch goes well. I speak without reading my notes. I bring out the essential facts of progress in the past decade and portray some of the people I met. Our follow-up discussion is lively and friendly. I sell seven copies of the book. Half of us go to a pub and continue our discussion. I overnight in Didcot with my generous hosts, Dave and Carol.

In the morning, Dave and Carol take me to the train station. It takes nearly four hours to Leeds and costs a small fortune, twice what it would cost in Denmark and that fare is already too expensive. The train trip was OK, a bit too cold but OK.

At Leeds, I must pass through several train and tube stairwells and control points. The loudspeakers blare out their messages of fear every few minutes; there are huge signs instructing me about my bags and proclaiming that the state is working for my security, all in the name of freedom and democracy, of course.

Richard meets me as I come out of one control area. His broad-smiling face and warm hand grip allows me to relax. He has a full program for me these three evenings I am to live with him. Over a Guinness, he prepares me for tomorrow’s day school. A friend, a colleague in the huge law firm he works for, comes up. Richard wants us to talk about Cuba, which we do while sipping our ale. Now, it is time to meet his father, Terry, and have dinner. Terry is a recently retired teacher. They have a house outside the city where I am made at home.

The big day goes well. About 65 people attend the two general assembly sessions. A CSC executive gives a good keynote speech. In the afternoon, Julia Buxton delivers a great talk on Venezuela. In between, four workshops are held. Mine, on Cuba today, attracts over 25 people. My talk is based upon the following speech I had written and used as reference at all four engagements during this trip. I include it here, basically in its entirety.#

Police state and Cuba

Once the workshops end, I am on a panel responding to many comments and questions. Several of us go out afterwards for drinks and food.

The next day, I participate with many anti-fascist activists in distributing leaflets door-to-door, which expose what the homegrown pro-fascist political party, BNP, stands for. The town of Morley had been selected because a BNP member had been elected to the town council.

I spend some time with MP Colin Burgon, an active supporter of Cuba and Venezuela. He is a knowledgeable man with lots of charm and human sensitivity.

In the evening, Richard takes me to a party of young people. At 25, Richard is the oldest among friends, and I, at 67, am not made to feel “old”. These people are much like I was at their age when we were spreading a counter-culture through much of the US and fighting the government’s war in Vietnam, its attacks on Cuba, its racism and anti-democratic policies.

The next day, November 6, I say farewell to Richard and Terry once they take me to the train. The trip from Leeds to London Kings Cross and then to meet Duncan Chapple is not relaxing. I sit in a rest, no-telephone car. The man in front of me is talking loudly on his mobile telephone. I try to ignore him but can’t. I don’t want to hear of his life. I tell him this is a no-telephone coach. He doesn’t even look at me and jabbers on. I wait seconds and then repeat my plea. He ignores me again. Then I speak loudly enough for everyone else to hear. This time, he can’t ignore me. He glares at me hostilely. He puts his mobile down, stands up and nearly lunges at me as he sticks his finger in my lapel.

“You are aggressive,” he yells between clenched teeth. We manage to untangle one another without coming to fist-a-cuffs. For the remainder of the trip, we do not look at one another.

At Kings Cross, I must buy a tube ticket and stand in a long line to do so. I place my two heavy bags beside two posts holding ropes which separate our curving line. The loudspeakers blare their messages of fear. “Watch your bags.” I am at no time more than three meters from my bags and I am watching them. Suddenly, a large man shouts loudly: “Does anyone belong to these bags?” I answer in the affirmative. He tells me, in a military manner, that I must hold on to my bags. As I do not move to comply with his order, he stares down at me without blinking. I am a threat which he must dominate. I can’t let him think that I am less than he so I stare back. As the seconds drag by, I imagine these two machos staring at one another in a manner that if eyes were knives we would be slitting throats. I take the initiative to disengage:

“Are we to stare at each other until the end of the line?” He continues staring. I look elsewhere. Maybe he won the battle, I don’t know. But the anti-terror authorities certainly have terrorized their citizenry. Not one of the 50 or so people in line make a pip about the matter of how closely one must be in contact with one’s bags.

I buy my ticket and make the next tube to Victoria station. I am early for my meeting with Duncan and have to pee. I hobble into the nearest pub with my three bags. I ask the bartender for an ale and where I may urinate.

“It is upstairs. You must take your bags with you.”
I look at the long narrow staircase beside the large bar counter and then at him increduously.

There is no mistaking his decision. The other two bartenders confirm that that is the law.

It takes some limping and sighing to make the trip upstairs. The toilets are locked. A sign says one must have a code to enter. Down again. A red-faced man wearing a poppy in his lapel, in honor of those who died in one or more of the great wars, kindly offers to watch my bags. I get the code and up again. I reach the urinal in time. A regular customer is peeing beside me. He explains that the terror situation makes it inconvenient for normal customers, and the reason for the toilet doors being locked is, “To prevent vagrants from coming in to get warm. Why, they sometimes are here a long time, especially in the winter.”

So, I should not doubt the wisdom of it all, the regular customer seems to be saying.

Downstairs, I sit on a stool with my bags pressed between my legs. I can’t help glancing at one of several huge screens beaming Murdoch television shows. I glance from the screen to the customers. Almost all are men. Most wear suits and most hold onto one or two briefcases or bags, either on their laps or by their stools. One man stands with an ale in one hand and a big suitcase in the other.

SKY TV is telling us that an English-born Muslim with Middle-Eastern heritage is on trial for threatening to murder people in the name of Islam. The number of Iraqis killed today is unknown (as always) but there is confirmation of more than 50 dead bodies in five places. The coalition forces were in several battles today.

I think of what I saw not long ago on another Murdoch television show. That was on Fox TV in the world’s greatest democratic land. A man, calling himself a journalist—O´Reilly I think is his name—was telling his listeners how absolutely sinful it was of Iraqi terrorists to kill and mutilate the bodies of two American soldiers. The fact that the mutilation took place after they were killed in combat in the country that were occupying made no significant difference to this journalist. The journalist called for a curfew with instructions to shoot-to-kill all who break the curfew. He then asked his guest, an army colonel, what he thought of the disgusting situation of Iraqi terrorism. His crew-cut guest agreed with the tactic of shoot-to-kill-and-ask-questions-afterwards. He strengthened this by saying: “Leave the bodies on the streets.”

SKY TV continues with today’s news: two English children were murdered by their father; a conservative politician is criticized for sending racist emails; from now on is it forbidden to have any liquid on one’s person or hand baggage in the departure area of airports and on aircrafts; EU’s stepped up security measures will include more tightening terror laws.

The biggest news is the death penalty for Saddam Hussein. The politicians and their journalists are telling us that this is a big victory for democracy. Somehow or another, they leave out that the defendant did not have the right to be defended by his lawyers; that two or three of them had been murdered; that the presiding judge had been replaced by another, because the government had decided that the first judge was too fair toward the defendant; that the very court itself is illegal in the eyes of all international laws regarding court composition and jurisdiction; that Secretary of State Donald Rumsfield hand delivered Saddam Hussein $1.5 billion in a bank guarantee, on December 20, 1983, for chemical and biological weapons and thus United States leaders must be put on trial as well.

Outside the pub, I see a man around 35 wearing glasses approaching me directly. Duncan shakes my hand and takes a bag. We walk to another ramp to await another type of tube, over-ground, which will take us to his house in West Dulwich. I see many policemen about. They walk around in groups of four. They stop men who wear shabby clothing. They ask for their tickets. If they don’t have a ticket they can be kicked out of the station, or even taken to jail if they don’t have the money to buy a ticket. The trains are private now but the tax-funded police patrol for the private companies. There are also private security people. They watch us as well. And the loud speakers blare messages of terror.

At Duncan’s flat, we exchange information about ourselves and the book launching tomorrow. It is to be held at the Indian YMCA. On the way to my talk the next day, I notice a gigantic sign near Duncan’s house. It states that “Police Enforcement Cameras” are present. Duncan says there are hundreds, maybe thousands of these signs all over London, and West Dulwich is just a suburb.

My talk is captured on video, which can be seen on my website. The discussion is again quite lively, also in the pub afterwards. This time, however, there is a more theoretical approach to some of the topics. My view that some authoritarianism by revolutionary governments is necessary in some circumstances—as long as capitalism-imperialism exists and is thwarting peoples’ governments wherever it can—is not accepted by most in the audience. Other questions are also taken up: what after Fidel; would an end to the boycott weaken Cubans’ resistance; why is there so much inefficiency; what about socialist democracy.

The next two days, I am with Theodore (Theo) and his wife Chris in their “retirement” house in Littlehampton. Theo is the most fantastic person, the most energetic man one can hope to meet. His long life (73) is saturated with activities and academia: three phds, one or two masters, four university chairs, 50 published books, living and working in a dozen lands, his wife bearing eight children—born in several countries—and them raising nine, who produce 14 grandchildren, all the while Theo is engaging in active solidarity work with Third World countries including Cuba. He speaks and or reads several languages including Chinese, and does all this while fighting cancer with partial blindness for the past five years. All this Theo can do while taking 20 kilometer walks most days of the week.

We talk about big issues, not only contemporary wars and other tragedies but also the origin of the human race, ethics, and greed: is greed inevitable, eternal. One thorny problem, which continuously crops up, is one that weakens the left’s ability to defeat the established order of inequality and permanent war. Why is the left so cannibalistic?

Without coming to a definitive conclusion, we spoke of self-defensive mechanisms that trigger many leftists. We have a long history of being “losers” in the eyes of the Establishment. We’re always in the minority, almost never able to exert any prominence. Even when Communists held power in several 2nd/3rd world countries, there was real danger everywhere, and those of us in the 1st world saw dangers everywhere even when there were none. Many of us are bright people with a wealth of knowledge and useful skills, yet we are either not self-realized or our politics certainly are not. So, many of us tend to beat our breasts; we piss off a small territory we claim as ours and outsiders beware.

Theo walks me and his pup to the bus stop, explaining to me when I can safely walk across the street. We embrace and I depart. The bus trip to Southampton is uneventful, thank god.

Eleanor and Mike drive me and a friend to the meeting place. There are about 25 people present, the largest meeting this new branch has had. The discussion is stimulating. Most of the participants come to a pub afterwards where we continue our discussion. One man let it be known that he thought some of my views were inappropriate as a solidarity activist. He had voted against me appearing at the CSC gathering. After hearing me, he was uncertain how he would vote again. My critic insisted, however, in keeping my ale mug full and bought a copy of my book. He had never been to Cuba and would not go because, “Tourism does them harm. It brings about inequality.”

“Yes,” I reply, “it does. But they all know it does, while, at the same time, it helps them economically. And the leadership, and almost all Cubans, and the solidarity committees here and around the world, urge people to go to Cuba as one direct way of aiding them. They need the foreign currency, and the direct contact helps the visitors return to their countries with a better understanding. Their direct knowledge of Cuba is spread to more people and this diminishes the notion that Cuba is any danger. This makes it all the more difficult for the Yankees to invade Cuba when so few people in the world will stand silently by.”

The next day, the bus takes me back to London’s Victoria Station. I ask a railway worker how many cameras there are. He says that there must be 300 alone at the 19 train platforms. This does not include the many more at the tube ramps. A rolling screen managed by the police states: “If you know anyone who carries knives or weapons call the police...” I see a newspaper headline: “Bullying, a worry for 7 in 10 pupils.” No wonder!

My last two nights are spent at Duncan’s house. I have time to interview one of the last remaining International Brigade veterans. Sam Russell had fought in Spain during the 1936-39 “civil war”. He, like I, had just seen a play, Ay, Carmela, made in homage of the brigaders.

Returning

On the tube, November 13, 0700, I am warned to hold my bags. At Gatwick airport, cops in groups of four roam about. Yellow-vested airport security guards, mostly young, majority girls, are shouting at every entrance way, crook and corner: “You can not take any liquids on the airplanes. You must pack them in your baggage. You can only take one handbag on the plane. Women’s handbags count as one bag. Throw all liquids in the buckets available at departure.”

At the departure gateway, a score of airport security are yelling at us: Liquids in bucket. Single file. To the right sir, single file, hurry up. I utter a spontaneous response: Baaha, baaha! Only one person in the line makes any expression: his lips curl up in a slight smile. But two or three security guards send me icy looks.

At security checkpoint, everything must be taken out of pockets; belt off. I go into the alarming doorway. No alarm rings yet the two guards tell me to raise my hands over my head and spread my legs. They check my body up and down. “Pop your wallet out, sir!” My wallet is inspected thoroughly. Then I am allowed to fetch my coat, belt, handbag and loose change and pen.

Then through to departure gateway and hurriedly up stairs to the smoking area where one cannot drink. I meet a tall black man smoking, calmly. I think I might be able to speak to him, a potential “brother”. I comment in an anxious way about all the security. He says it is nothing compared to what he has lived with for nearly three years, in Iraq. Iraq! Oh my god, he’s one of THEM! It is not easy to find brothers at airports.

Finally, on the Sterling again squeezed between passengers with my legs half-bent. In the 90 minute trip, I manage to down most of three small bottles of wine. I spilled half of the first bottle, my pouring hand was so shaky.

Upon landing, I rush to the S-tog and make it to Grethe’s apartment without any more trouble. I find my medicine stash and inhale as though I were asthmatic.

Conclusion

I had spoken to and with about 150 people in four talks. Around 50 copies of the book were sold between the publisher and me. I doubt that I made any effective impact, which could actually aid Cuba in its drive to ward off United States aggression. Everyone I spoke with was already convinced. Maybe, though, a few of my books might get into the hands of people who could learn something of benefit. On the minor matter of my own personal approach to solidarity writing, I am also doubtful that I changed the thinking of those who have a more closed view of what is permissible within the context of support and constructive criticism.

The big problem for those of us who are opponents of the US “counter-revolution” (see Edward Herman below) is that the majority of the working class, in the wealthier countries, submits to the imperialistic agenda. That is why I observed mostly people who cowed down before the terrorizing atmosphere in which their government had placed them.

While it seems that this is the case for the majority in the “First World”, most people I actually talked with in England were understanding people, who actively take on imperialism and its terror. Our discussions were conducted in an open-minded manner. I received many positive comments: refreshing talk; you show great breadth and are not sectarian; you made my day with your portrayal of real people in a real revolution.

I close with comments made by Edward Herman, a US economist, in his compelling essay, “Notes on the counter-revolution’s progress”, which was translated in the Danish magazine, “Kommunist Politics”, nr. 14, 28 July-17 August, 2006. His term “counter-revolution” refers to the idea that the United States stood behind the fall of the Soviet Union and state socialism, and thus it is the promulgator of the “counter-revolution”, which overthrew “the communist revolution”.

“The counter-revolution’s foreign policy aims’ include the advantage that it raises a moral climate in which an anti-people agenda can be promoted...Fear for the foreign devil is stimulated, patriotism is raised to a duty, and the media and the broad population is led to focus on the armed powers’ triumphs and tragedies, which cause havoc abroad…

“Under that cover of protection, opponents of the counter-revolution can be attacked as subversives and traitors, and the super-patriotic (almost always militaristic civilians) counter-revolutionaries can consolidate their political power and easily realize their internal economic program.”

#Cuba Today

I speak about Cuba today bearing in mind that I knew it first hand for eight years from the end of the best economic years to the worst years. My point of view is to tell the truth as it can be known factually, and to tell the truth as I see it. When we are allowed to pursue the facts, and are told them by our leaders, then we are more solid in our support even if we learn of disconcerting aspects. If we have been lied to or if we have been prevented from discovering reality, we feel cheated when the outcome is uncovered, and often many then leave the struggle.

Cuba is the home of my heart, and as such I want it to be the best possible home—not only for Cubans but for all of us who yearn to create and live in a world based upon justice and equality, where peace can reign because all our basic needs are met, including the subjective ones of love and solidarity with one another. That means that economic classes—in which there are profits for a few, wages for most and nothing for many—must be replaced by one holistic ocean of people sharing what nature provides and what we produce.

In order for this to happen, we must understand the reality in which we and others live. That means it is necessary, and not an intellectual luxury or provocation, to speak the truth. As many revolutionary teachers have said, “truth is revolutionary”. From knowing and speaking the truth, we must act to shape a new reality more beneficial to us all.

CUBAN ADVANCE

What the Cuban people have accomplished in half-a-century is astounding and inspiring. They are no longer “at the crossroads”, as I wrote in 1994, but have gone “beyond the crossroads”.

In the past three years, Cubans have achieved extraordinary results in many areas:

1. Economic growth has leapt from a mere three or four percent to 11 percent, the highest in all Latin America and one of the world’s highest.

2. Operation Miracle has been created. It is a special surgical method that cures many types of blindness’s: cataracts, retractile disorders, corneal glaucoma, myopias and strabismus. In just two years, over 300,000 people—mostly poor—have been cured by Cuban doctors in 25 countries. Cuba has more doctors and medical personnel in more countries serving free of charge to millions of patients than all the world’s nations put together. (25,000 of their 70,000 graduated doctors). And Cuba has the greatest ratio of doctors to the population (1 to 160) than any other nation—that is nearly twice the amount in the US where medical care is too costly for the individual.

3. Electrical energy use is growing by leaps and bounds as is electricity savings. Every house has had their high energy and carbon polluting electrical bulbs replaced with low energy, low polluting and long-lasting ones. The first lights and new filaments were given away by the state.

The UN International Energy Agency reports that no other nation has taken their cautions about energy wastes and global warming as seriously as has Cuba. Every home has, or soon will have, new pressure cookers, electric plates, rice cookers, soup and meat cookers, a simple heating apparatus for bathing, and the replacement of high energy using refrigerators and television sets—all at low costs with interest free payments.

4. Public transportation by bus and train has been vastly improved in the last two years, thanks to an increase in economic relations with China.

5. Cuba also imports low-cost oil from Venezuela and is digging its own oil in much greater quantities than ever before.

6. Building construction and repairs have been prioritized: Hundreds of new schools, hospitals and clinics have been built and even more hundreds repaired and remodeled.

Going back a decade when Cuba was at its lowest economic level, when people were eating fewer calories and proteins than recommended as the minimum by WHO, we witness tremendous improvements. People now consume on average of 3300 calories and 82 grams protein (WHO recommends 2400 calories and 72 grams protein).

Infant mortality approximates England’s. At 5.6 per 1000 births, it is half what it was a decade ago—and is lower than the US’s 6.5 average while it is14.5 for blacks. Life longevity has increased to 77 years—longer than in the US. There is no real poverty in Cuba, no homeless or people without food, clothing, medical care, while in the US official poverty figures are 12% of the population and in England it is 17%. Unemployment is under 2%, while in the US and UK it is 5% or more.

In fact, in these last few years the standard of living for Cubans, as a whole, is as good, or better, than it was when the Soviet Union and Comecon financed much of their economy.

Besides economic growth, there is greater emphasis on bringing the youth into the revolution as activists and leaders. The average age of Communist party and government leadership is now in the 40s, lower than a decade ago. And, as we have seen since Fidel’s illness, there is no problem with six men—some of them relatively young--leading the state now.

The governmental program “Battle of Ideas” began at the turn of the century. The government long ago realized that the revolution can only succeed if it is in permanent development, especially for the youth who were not alive during the dramatic times of guerrilla warfare and clandestine city warfare.

The state began social missions to improve the lot of all Cubans. The activists to implement these programs are some 50,000 university and secondary school youths on leave from school. They educate sick and handicapped people, 150,000 marginal youths who had not been studying or working, visit families in need of personal attention; and many are managing gas stations against corruption by part of the working class—interestingly enough—; others are spraying Cuba’s own biological product against dengue-carrying mosquitoes, and even more are carrying through the electric energy savings programs…

The state can use school-aged youth for these important social missions because many young people yearn to take part, and because the state has doubled its budget for education in the last decade—from about 10% to 20% of the national budget, which is more allotted for education than any other government I know of.

As a result of this emphasis, every Cuban classroom has a TV with educational programs, every school has computers, no more than 20 students per teacher in elementary classrooms and 1 teacher to 15 junior high students; 86,000 youths are studying full-time in Cuba’s 65 universities, and nearly 400,000 youths and adults are studying university courses through university branches in each of the 169 municipalities. Since the revolution began, 800,000 people have been graduated with university degrees=7% of the population.

Cuba stands before the whole world as a beacon of light, especially so for 2/3 of the world’s most underdeveloped and oppressed peoples. And Cubans are aware of this. When they launch strategies, they take into account both their own people and other peoples.

Battle of ideas’ goal is to fortify its ideology, endeavoring “to reach everybody, that no one is ever abandoned or unattended,” as former Minister of Education, Dr. Luis Gómez Gutiérrez, said in February 2005. “We pin our hopes on this utopia and the results we have obtained breathe life into our optimism. We are building the fairest, most equal society that has ever been known in the history of humankind.”

There are left-wingers in the “First World,” including many classical Marxists, who spurn the idea that Cubans and their leader Fidel are truly Marxists. They say they are but reform pragmatists and Don Quixotes. Just mentioning the word “utopia” as something positive is “proof” that they are subjective romantics and thereby anti-Marxists.

One of the seminars I attended was on “Marxism and Utopia”, held at the prestigious Casa de las Americas. It was not directed against utopianism, which is something one can dream about and work towards albeit pure utopia may never be reached. But tropical Marxism is not like the European textbooks where rationality is placed upon the subjective. That Cuba tries to incorporate all the more the objective and subjective factors show the flexibility of the leadership.

The ideas of permanent revolution reign in Cuba today. Many leaders and ordinary people embrace and try to practice the strategy first taught by Marx and followed up in a book by Leon Trotsky, “Permanent Revolution,” which he wrote in 1905, while imprisoned. It has three main aspects:

(1) The democratic tasks of backward bourgeois nations, such as Russia then, lead directly to the struggle for the dictatorship of the proletariat, which puts socialism on the order of the day—despite a weak industrial base.

When Fidel was asked by a European Marxist if he thought that Cuba, another underdeveloped agricultural-based country, could actually create a socialist revolution given that Marx had predicted only advanced industrial lands with a large working class could do such, he replied to the effect: Here the majority live in miserable conditions, and they are subjectively ready to overthrow the dictatorship. What are we to do: cross our arms and wait until the objective conditions are ripe? No, we forge the revolutionary overthrow and start fresh.

(2) Socialist revolution itself must undergo transformation; it keeps changing its skin, both in the arenas of material development and subjective consciousness. Communist morality is as important as economic development.

As Che later said, paraphrasing: From day one of the Cuban revolution, the New Man must be created…The entire country is one great university of learning.

(3) Without being a Trotskyist, and at the risk of being denigrated by his opponents, I dare quote what Trotsky then wrote about the international aspect of the permanent revolution:

“The international character of the socialist revolution…flows from the present state of economy and the social structure of humanity. Internationalism is no abstract principle but a theoretical and political reflection of the character of world economy…and the world scale of the class struggle. The socialist revolution begins on national foundations-but it cannot be completed within these foundations…If it remains isolated, the proletarian state must finally fall victim to () contradictions.”

Without probably having studied Trotsky, the Cuban leadership is enacting his three principle aspects of permanent revolution, and especially so since the fall of the Soviet Union and Comecon. The whole thrust within Latin America today, to which Fidel is the principle author, is to make a regional socialist revolution, one which Lenin and Trotsky sought in Europe. And today, studying the works of Trotsky, Luxemburg, Gramsci and other European Marxist theoreticians is allowed or even encouraged.

CHALLENGES

1. I believe that the weakest area of the revolution is in the advancement of proletarian dictatorship—or, in reality, true democracy—in decision-making from the ground level at work centers to national and international policies. You can see more about this in the last chapters of my book.

There should be a greater process of checks and balances within the revolution. Grass roots organizations and municipal governments, unions, women’s and youth groups should be able to evaluate and partially shape the policies of state institutions and control how there are carried out.

The voting process could be enhanced by entailing some debate over policies within the framework of socialism and the revolution.

But steps are being taken to improve democracy. Two examples: The new national union leadership was recently elected by a council of worker delegates, not appointed by the Central Committee; social workers and sociologists are beginning to play a progressive role in grass roots areas, in some barrios.

2. The media is still too closed to criticism. This is a most delicate area and one I know personally as a journalist, writer and translator for Cuban media. It is not easy to find a fruitful way to allow a healthy debate, a constructively critical approach to leadership and state policy while, at the same time, preventing the enemy from entering the media and eventually dominating its agenda with its gigantic economic and technological resources—such as it has done in country after country (Chile, Nicaragua, and now Venezuela and Bolivia). But there must be greater efforts.

A recent Sunday series in the youth daily newspaper, Juventud Rebelde, is a good example. The notion that some incompetent state institutions, such as those which deliver supplies and tools for repairs of home appliances and maintenance of residences, be organized as private cooperatives is, for the first time, in the domain of public debate.

The most important point here is to have us Cuban supporters understand that no government, no leader, no revolution can be perfect but that we must participate, in some way or another, in making it more perfect. That is the very essence of revolution=a constantly changing, permanent revolution is a healthy one. A stagnant one dies out, as modern history in our own lifetime has clearly shown. I believe that the experience of Cuba is the most positive illustration which we have today of flexibility and permanent change.

SOLIDARITY with CUBA

1. You know better than I what you can do in concrete ways to support the Cuban revolution in your own country. I know, for example, that one of the most effective methods used has been your own experience in organizing across the country to put massive people pressure on the government of Bushite Blair. The fact that most MPs felt the need to state yes or no—and most said no—to support an eventual military attack by its chief ally is a significant support for Cuba, and shows your citizens that people organizing can accomplish something positive for peace and respect for sovereignty.

2. I can mention a couple of things I think could be useful to consider. One is that we would be even stronger and more effective if we stopped making litmus tests on people and groups who support and want to support Cuba. We are involved in solidarity work based on the strategy of a PEOPLE’S FRONT, not a united front or that of one political party program. We seek support from any circle or even class that will respect Cuba’s sovereign rights. I think that support should not entail confronting the Cuban people or its government with “Conditions”. This idea of “conditional support” is chauvinist and, furthermore, ineffective. No self-respecting government, no independent government is going to accept support on such elitist terms. That does not mean that I think we must be uncritical, but criticism must be constructive, friendly, and without conditions. What occurred during the time of the Soviet Union was often not constructive. If Cuba acted in brutal ways that the Soviet Union often did, I might take another direction. But I don’t want to get into that mess now.

One possible future action could be the organizing of international peace brigades to hold watch before the US’s torture base at Guantánamo—of course, with the Cuban government’s approval. It could be seen as provocative at this stage, but conditions change. Guantánamo has been, and I’m sure it still is, a possible launching area for military aggression. We might be able to help prevent such a development by being on the scene and thereby arouse media attention and international condemnation. I think we should be prepared for such a guarding tactic, and even bring it up with comrades in Cuba for the notion to gestate.

Finally, solidarity with Cuba means to me solidarity with our own peoples. We can best help Cuba when more of us are better organized against the profiteering war-makers who dominate our own economies and governments. It IS in the interests of our working peoples to fight for a radical change in economy and governing at home, and that is tied to supporting the Cuban process, which we can use in our territories
END

December 12, 2006
www.ronridenour.com
ronr@mail.dk

---

Copyright © 2006-2009 Ronridenour.com