Cuba : what everyone needs to know PDF
Preview Cuba : what everyone needs to know
CUBA WHAT EVERYONE NEEDS TO KNOW This page intentionally left blank CUBA WHAT EVERYONE NEEDS TO KNOW JULIA E. SWEIG 1 2009 1 Oxford University Press, Inc., publishes works that further Oxford University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education. Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offi ces in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Copyright © 2009 by Julia E. Sweig Published by Oxford University Press, Inc. 198 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016 www.oup.com Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of Oxford University Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Sweig, Julia Cuba : what everyone needs to know / Julia E. Sweig. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-19-538379-9; 978-0-19-538380-5 (pbk.) 1. Cuba—Politics and government—1959–1990. 2. Cuba—History—Revolution, 1959. 3. Cuba—Politics and government—1990– 4. Cuba—Foreign relations—United States. 5. United States—Foreign relations—Cuba. I. Title F1788.S955 2009 972.9106'4—dc22 2009014819 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper For Reed, for everything This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS xv INTRODUCTION xvii Cuba before 1959 What were the main features of Cuban life during Spanish colonial rule? 1 How did Cuba’s independence movement gain momentum, and what was its relationship to abolition? 4 Who was José Martí? 6 How did Cuba’s fi nal war for independence begin? 8 Why did the United States intervene and how did the Cuban War of Independence come to be known as the Spanish-American War? 8 What kind of independence did Cuba gain and what was the Platt Amendment? 11 What were the early years of Cuban independence like and how did the Platt Amendment impact Cuba’s political culture? 12 Why does the United States have a naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba? 15 What was the political climate out of which Fulgencio Batista fi rst emerged? 16 How did Cuban politics and U.S.-Cuban relations evolve between 1934 and 1952? 17 viii Contents What were the origins of the Cuban Revolution? How did it succeed? 20 What role did women play in the Cuban insurrection? 27 How did race relations fi gure into Cuba’s political development during the prerevolutionary period? 29 Beyond the realms of politics and economics, how closely intertwined had Cuban and American culture become by the 1950s? 33 The Cuban Revolution and the Cold War, 1959–91 DOMESTIC 36 Why did the Batista regime collapse? 36 What was so special about Fidel Castro? 36 What did the Communist Party have to do with it all and were the Soviets involved? 37 After Fidel took power, what happened to the other revolutionary groups? 39 What did Che Guevara do after 1959? 39 What did the fi rst revolutionary cabinet look like? 40 Was Castro really a Communist? 41 So, did communism mean no democracy? 43 How did the revolution organize Cuban society? 45 Why did Cubans start leaving for exile? 47 What kind of backlash was there to the revolution’s radicalization? 48 What kind of benefi ts did the revolution deliver and to whom? 50 How did race factor into the equation? 53 In a notoriously patriarchal society, how did women fare under the revolution? 55 What kind of space did the regime allow for intellectuals and artists? 56 How did the regime deal with its adversaries in the exile community? 58 How did the revolution handle religion? 62 Contents ix Why did the revolution make such a big deal out of sports? 64 What about Cuba’s human rights record during this period? 65 Why did King Sugar continue to dominate Cuba’s economy after the revolution? 68 What were the main economic features of Cuba’s integration with the Soviet bloc? 70 What was “rectifi cation”? How did Fidel and Raul Castro view the prospect of market reforms in the 1980s? 71 Who was General Arnaldo Ochoa and why was he executed? 73 U.S.-CUBA 74 Was there ever a chance that the United States would react well to the Cuban revolutionaries? 74 How much weight did U.S. economic interests have in driving the two countries apart? 76 What really happened when Castro visited Washington in 1959? 78 Why did the Bay of Pigs invasion fail? 79 After the invasion fi asco, did the United States continue covert operations against Cuba and how did the United States involve Cuban exiles? 82 What was the Cuban Missile Crisis? 84 How did U.S. attempts to overthrow Castro play inside of Cuba? 87 What was the scope of U.S. economic sanctions? 88 How successful was the United States in isolating Cuba in the 1960s and into the 1970s? 89 What’s the story behind the Kissinger/Ford secret diplomacy with Cuba in 1974? 92 How did Jimmy Carter’s administration approach Cuba? 93 What was the Mariel boatlift? 96 Why did Reagan toughen up U.S. policy toward Cuba? 98 What did Reagan do to crack down on Cuba? 99 Who was Jorge Mas Canosa? 100 How did the Cuban American National Foundation emerge? 101 What is Radio Martí? 102
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