A VISIT WITH FIDEL

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000705860005-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 7, 2011
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: June 7, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/07 :CIA-RDP90-009658000705860005-4
1 I
WALL STRErT JOURNAL
7 June 1J85
'A Visit With Fidel
By A~rrxux Scfn.~stxcEa Je. :which is communist, seem more ahxe than ment," Mr. Castro tells us. "The negotia-
HAVANA-He is older now-he will be .two communist countries, one of which is tions over the migratory persons agree-
,58 in August-and his black hair and beard ',Latin American. ', ment had shown flexibility and mutual re-
! are tinged with gray. I would guess that he i One -feels rather that nationalism-a j sped," Cuba thereafter sent out signals in-
has put on weight. He has been persuaded Passionate, romantic, anti-yanqui, macho ~ dicating its desire for more discussions.
Ito give up the long thick Havana cigars Latin nationalism-is the mainspring of Then Radio Marti came like a harsh
that were once his trademark. Now he re- 'Mr. Castro's politics. North Americans, es- 'back of the hand from the U.S. "Why was
sorts to slim panetelas, and these spar- pecially in the age of Reagan, should be this done?" Mr. Castro asks, pulling a
iagly. He thinks Cubans stgolte too ranch ~~ to understand this ardent and prickly rumpled copy of the official II.S. notifica-
; and is teluctantty trying to set his coon- !national P~e? even as we object when E is tion out of au inner pocket and craving it at
trymen a good example. "In this cause," (displayed by nationals of another country. I ~, "Why do they want to create a conflict
', he says, "I am even prepared to throw Mr. Castro's hair-trigger nationalist sensi- ,now?" The explanation that Radio Marti
tivity accounts, I believe, for the indigna- (had long been in-the bureaucratic pipeline
away my cigars. That will be my last con- ! .
ttibution to the revolution." troe ~ sl~wrc ~`~ lgadtie ' ~ ~ ac and tbet ~ ~` ~e }} touid ~ ~~ ~
!counted for his indignation over the Soviet derstood as part of dramatic politics than
His vitality appears as boundless as ; decision to withdraw its nuclear~rr-issiles in of foreign policy does not satisfy him. We
ever, and he remains the great survivor. lye ~~ Ming him. ask Mr Castro how Ile now views ~ ~-
With the death of Enver Hoxha of Albania, ~ Radio Marti began its broadcasts on tore of the relationship. "Prospects for im-
'~, only Kim Il Sung of North Korea, King May 20;~N,uba's traditional independence provement .are nonexistent," he says
Hussein of Jordan and Alfredo Strcessner ;,day. Everywherewe weF-t that week in tie- ~,. ~>-~:
of Paraguay have been th power lour. ,~~ we ~~,~ local wrath, ft ~~, I~iot.t~'nderstgn~g hOw the U.S. gtrrtrrr
1 Des ite the CIA and seven U.S. residents `~~ ~~ insist. that ~y are~~ ~. I meat works, I1ar. Castro assumes that >~?
i an w at a now re ar s as the im lace- cer~ abtxtt Radio Merit's progtam$. The ' dio Marti is as elernertt ht a coherent plan,
b e enm~tY o e present a mistra ion in 'people who. operate Radio Marti? they ', per)taps leading on to a new attempt to
Washin on, Fidel Castro seems totally claim, know only "yesterday's Cuba" and I overthrow his regime. Cuban officials take
con i ent a ut u ore o. is regime j ~~ ~ ~ say to ~,~ try, Radio ~ ~p opportunity to stress their state of
an o is revo u ion. Wee are stock-
I saw im at a end of May. I had gone ~~ ~ ~ f-~~y ~ ~ mI}itary prepat~edAess. poAs
Voice of America and has, m the Cuban ',piled', across the country. Citizens are
earlier in the day with three other North ~, ?~ ~ Y. The Cubans dis- ;ti~inui to yf~ ttwm. "MiQ haze realty >ae-
Americans to the Bay of Pigs, and we met, ~~~claim ~, intention of jamming Radio I~~" ~. Castro recently gold a team
.in a slightly augmented group, with Mr. iMarti and indeed give it abundant public- 'from the Washington Post, "an inwinera-
ICastro that evening. Life has its ironies: It lity in their press.: ble, unconquerable and unoccupiable coun-
'was the day on which John Kennedy would i The Cubans are mad because they re- try; ' This wide distribution of weapons
have been 68. y' ' gard Radio Marti as an insult to their na= dces indicate the regime's confidence in
,The Full Tr'~~nt- tional dignity. They, especially resent the. the loyalty of the Cuban people. An unpop-
i Mr. Castro had spent a long day on the 'cynical exploitation of the revered national ular dictatorship would not dare run such
(hero by politicians who had never pre- ty~~,
', Isle of Pines with Javier Perez de Cuellar, viously heard of Jose Marti and still have The Reagan administration, Mr. Castro
'the secretary-general of the United Na- not read a line he has written. (According concludes, interprets every Cuban gesture
tions. But he was full of energy and talk to ~ ~~ Washington publication Times ~ ~ wifl ~ propf of Cuban weakness.
when he entered the conference room at 7 ' of the Americas, the first White House When Cubans express interest in better re-
p.m. For the next four hours he gave us ~, press release announced the intention of lotions, Washington says that the Russians
the full treatment-an endless, often bril- establishing a "Radio Jce Marti.") Jose :must ~e preparing to dump them or that
liant, flow of argument, analysis, admoni- Marti, who lived for many years in Brook- '.the economy must be in bad trouble. Lest a
tion, accusation, enlivened by jokes, pare- lyn, had great affection for the U.S. But he :response to Radio Marti be taken as
- , hies, metaphors, statistics, historical di- wlea~~ feo:fitl of the itrtpoct o; t pe'~ ~ wear. 11Lr. Casiso
j gressions, all pimctuat~ed by flourished et North American power on Latin America.- struck back by suspending the immigra-
jhis (unlit) cigar and by a splendid reper- ?fJnce the United States is in Cuba," he tion agreement. Machismo demanded a
Itoire of facial expressions. Whatever-else ',eked in 1889, "who will drive them out?" I bold vindication of national dignity. The
may be said of Fidel Castro, he is a great .,,The farther they draw away from the ;Cubans are determined, in the words of
performer. Efntted $ta~es,., he wrote ~ 1894, "the freer ' t>~teir owe c~r-a~iiinigae3.to dispel a8 d~tc
He is definitely proud of his Soviet con- and mare P~PQT~ the American people ' "as to our resisting as long as is neces-
nection and of his commitment to revolu? twill ~ ? ~ry,~ "T'he Reagan administration is ab-
tionary internationalism. He is deeply Mr Castro is angry, too, because Radio solutely wrong," Mr. Castro tells us, ' `if it
,grateful for Soviet aid, now running at (Marti has ended a hope he briefly Cher- bases. itself on the idea that we are
about S4 billion a year. He uses the Com- fished that Mr. Reagan in his second term 'afraid."
monist Party to organize his country and imight do for, communist Cuba what Rich- - He reaffirmed his,readiness to pull the
communist ideology to organize his pole- and Nixon had done for communist China. Cuban military presence out of Central
mics. Yet his Cuba lacks the griuwess and
~~ melancholy that Pervade the communist Mr. Castro woaild admittedty lll[e th trot' America raider ttrird party vertlicatiort if
satellites of Eastern Europe. His table talk ~~ ~ wtth Washington, tlwugh the U.S. weu3d do the same and repeated
is, on the whop, de~roid erf ~ cliches. '..never, he emphasizes. at the expense of ? his warnings against tJ.S. military inter-
'Perhaps commtmism is different itt a hot Cuba's collectivist economy or of its basic vention. "The reaction to Reagan's em-
~ climate. I was reminded of the French ~ relationship with the Soviet Union. He had bargo of Nicaragua proves that Latin
iaphorism: "Two deputies, one of whom is .been encouraged by the progress in bilat- America today is not what it was in 1961"
'a communist, are more alike than two oral negotiations that culminated in the when Cuba was excluded from the tlrgani-
tmmigration agreement of last December. '.?zation of American States.
communists, one of whom is a deputy." ?~
ITwro Latin American countries, one of Possibtlrttes ~~ for further improve- "The Reagan administration," Mr. Cas-
Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/07 :CIA-RDP90-009658000705860005-4
 Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/07 :CIA-RDP90-009658000705860005-4
tro continues, "seems to thtnK that we
need good relations with the United States.
We see it the other way around. We think
that good relations would do the United
States a favor." On two past occasions,
Carlos Rafael. Rodriguez, the urbane Com-
munist vice president, had told us in an
earlier interview, relations appeared to be
j moving toward normalization: in the last
months of the Kennedy administration, and
again during the Ford administration. The
first movement was terminated by Ken-
nedy's assassination; the second by Henry
Kissinger's sharp reaction to the Cuban
role bt A~18.
It is hard to quartrl MiU- Mr. Cash's
assessment of the immediate future. Mr.
Reagan is far more of an ideologue than
114x. l~ixebl. TheStale Depertmmt aetteratat-
tcaliq btasttes ott Gltban averhtres. Leslie
Gelb of the New York Times reports .the
' comment of a senior administration aide:
"Trying with Cuba isn't worth. the prob-
lems it'll cause with the right wing. And
besides with Cuts.. Yietaam and the San-
' dimes, ~ tatr't a~i~be~feets witlt
them because they won't keep them." Such
cracks enrage the Cuhaus, who point to the
meticulousness with which they executed
the immigration agreement until Radio
114arti came alasg and w~h arhtch they still
~~~ obset~e tltt sltyjaddng agreement, even
after it was annulled.
Nacth ~cY>o- P'Yp~tii~
There might well be advaHtages for the
U.S., as well as for Cuba, in normalization.
The opening of Cuba to U.S. trade and
tourism: could have far-reaching effects
within Cuba, where we were told that
North Americans -are far more popular
than the several thousand Russian special-
ists in the country. Better relations would
reduce the -Cuban threat as a Soviet mili-
tary" base add might lead to an easing of
tensions to Central A1rerica, even th Af-
rica. An imaginative policy might set in
motion a steady dilution of Cuban ties with
j the Soviet Union and bring the Reagan ad-
ministt`7tio:t what it has ss long Sacked-a
diplomatic success.
~ at6lt. ~t ant d>ssro~ It1t S~fet c~os~c-
tion or its commitment to revolutionary
solidarity. But for reasons of his own, Fi-
del Castro has evidently decided to rejoin
the Western Hemisphere. This new course
has ah~eedy tattled hiln away fintrt Iris old
i policy of revolutionary meddling in South
America. In time it might carry him away
', from excessive reliance on the Soviet Un-
ion. The Latin American external debt
gives his reentry both motive and opportu-
pity. It has become the dominating theme
in his discourse. Mr. Castro and the debt
will be the subject of a second report.
~~
Mr. 3c1aTvsiuger is filbert Selueeitzer
pressor of tlN' hsmernities et the City ilni?
versity of New York and a winner of Pulit?
zer Prizes in history and biography.
L
Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/07 :CIA-RDP90-009658000705860005-4