More Intrigue Regarding the Cuban Five
From The Center for International Policy Cuba Report
By Wayne S. Smith
Stephen Kimber’s forthcoming book “ What Lies Across the Water?” is perhaps the most complete account of the Cuban Five I’ve yet read – and I came away from reading it with a renewed sense of depression. No wonder! The case has long befouled the image of the United States as dedicated to justice, honor and fairplay. As Kimber notes, the trial back in 2001 was such a complete farce that it drew massive international criticism – from 10 Nobel Prize winners, from hundreds of jurists, members of parliaments and various other organizations all over the world, many of whom joined 12 amicus briefs asking the Supreme Court to review the case. And for the first time in history, the UN Human Rights Commission condemned a trial in the United States.
Kimber follows the Cubans as they are assigned to the United States as undercover agents, not to work against the U.S. but to gather information on exile terrorist activities against Cuba. The Cuban government then invited representatives of the FBI to come to Havana to receive and discuss the evidence of these terrorist activities and plans gathered by the agents. The meeting took place in June of 1998. The Cubans then waited for the United States to take action against the exile terrorists. But none was taken. The only action, rather, was the arrest of the Cuban Five, they who had provided much of the evidence turned over to the FBI.
At the time, I wrote this off as simply another example of the U.S. government’s almost chronic inability to respond rationally to Cuba – and in this case to do what in fact would have served U.S. interests. Having read Kimber’s book, however, I now see there may have been more to it than that. We knew about the Havana meeting with the FBI. But few knew – and I certainly did not – that the meeting had in effect been prompted by Fidel Castro in a message delivered in the White House by Gabriel Garcia Marquez to President Clinton’s top Latin American adviser, Thomas Mack McLarty, and three senior NSC officials. The core of the message had been to suggest a joint effort against exile terrorism – especially in light of Cuban information that the exiles were planning new plane bombings – such as those carried out earlier by Luis Posada Carriles. According to Garcia Marquez, the American reaction to the idea of a joint effort had been decidedly positive.
What then had happened? Why the exact opposite of what seems to have been intended? Kimber believes it had to do with the FBI’s assignment of a new Agent in Charge, Hector Pesquera, who was close to the hardline Cuban exiles. Kimber writes that “in an interview with a Miami radio station soon after the verdicts, Pesquera claimed he was the one who switched his agents’ focus from spying on the spies to filing charges against them.” [1]
And “after the verdict in the Cuban Five trial, Pesquera was quick to claim credit for persuading officials in Washington to OK his plan,.i.e., to go after the Cuban Five rather than the exile terrorists. He told the Miami Herald the case ‘never would have made it to court’ if he hadn’t lobbied FBI Director Louis Freeh directly.” [2]
Kimber goes on to write that “at the same time, Pesquera apparently discouraged investigations into exile terrorism. An FBI agent told journalist Annie Bardach, that they’d thought it would be a slam dunk to charge and arrest Luis Posada Carriles. But then they had a meeting with the chief [i.e. Pesquera] who’d said no, that “lots of Folks around here think Posada is a freedom fighter. We were in shock. And then they closed down the whole Posada investigation.”[3]
Kimber tried repeatedly to interview Pesquera, but without success. The latter retired from the FBI and then simply stopped responding to Kimber’s e-mails.
The outcome, Kimber concludes, was the exact opposite of what had been contemplated at that White House meeting all those years ago. Rather than efforts to halt exile terrorist acts, the United States arrested the Cuban Five – although “tried” is not the right word, for the trial was a sham. The prosecutors had no real evidence and so fell back to the old standby of trying them for “conspiracy” to commit illegal acts. No evidence, and they were tried in Miami where anti-Castro sentiment had reached such a level with the Elian Gonzalez case that there was no chance of empanelling an impartial jury. Defense lawyers requested a change of venue, but incredibly, it was denied.
Worst of all was the case of Gerardo Hernandez, who was accused of “conspiracy” to commit murder and given two consecutive life sentences, plus fifteen years – this in connection with the shoot down of the two Brothers to the Rescue planes in February of 1996. Never mind that there was no evidence that he was responsible. But there, behind bars, he remains today, mostly in solitary confinement and after all these years not allowed a single visit from his wife.
What may have begun with constructive intentions at that White House meeting all those years ago thus ends – so far – in shame.
_______
[1] Kimber, “What Lies Across the Water”, p. 286.
[2] Kimber, op. cit., p. 286.
[3] Kimber, op. cit., p. 286.
Wayne Smith
Director
LATIN AMERICA RIGHTS & SECURITY: CUBA PROJECT
Copyright 2012 Sting of the Wasp: The Cuban Five Connection
René González responds to Washington Post editorial on Alan Gross
On December 31, 2011, the Washington Post published an editorial demanding the return of Alan Gross, an American government contractor sentenced to 15 years in Cuban prison for illegally bringing telecommunications equipment into the country.
In the editorial, the Post claimed Cuba saw Gross as a "potential bargaining chip" to win the release of the Cuban Five, a group of Cuban intelligence agents sentenced to harsh prison terms in the U.S. for "conspiracy to commit" espionage.
"There is no equivalence, moral or otherwise, between the illegal espionage of the Cubans and the conduct of Mr. Gross. The five Cubans were sentenced to long prison terms in 2001 for, among other things, operating as undeclared foreign agents and infiltrating U.S. military installations in South Florida. All are acknowledged intelligence officers, unlike Mr. Gross, a would-be humanitarian who got himself caught up in the U.S.-Cuban dispute over U.S. efforts to promote civil society on the island."
René González, the only one of the Five to be released from prison—but who is still currently forced to serve his parole in the U.S.—has written a powerful, thoughtful response to the editorial (see below).
He's encouraging others to read the Post's editorial and write their own letters to the editor to challenge the inaccuracies in the piece and to push the American media to finally report completely and fairly on the case of the Five.
****
From: René González
mailing address: undisclosed for personal safety.
relation to the issue: I'm one of the Cuban Five mentioned in the editorial.
Telephone: undisclosed for personal safety.
Dear Editor:
Your editorial regarding the case of Alan Gross -and in passing the one of the Cuban Five- is so charged with factual inaccuracies that it can only be explained -at least in part- by the astonishing decision by the American media to not publish anything of the longest "espionage" trial in the history of the country, which ended up on such harsh sentences that would suggest a danger to the US that everybody on the planet should have been aware of. I won't burden you with all the inaccuracies and will only refer to a few of them.
It is true that it is illegal for Cuba to connect to the Internet. After all, the whole country is banned by the US government to hook up to the underwater cable that runs parallel to the Cuban coast, just north of the island. It strains credibility that the Washington Post wouldn't be able to find the truth about such a simple factual matter. That the same government that prohibits the whole island to connect to the web then devices a clandestine operation to decide which Cubans will have the privilege to circumvent the very prohibition that he imposes on the country's citizenry can hardly be considered of a humanitarian character.
That the Jewish Cuban community had anything to do with that operation has been the most often repeated lie of the last two years. The cynicism of having played the Jewish card on this case lies on somebody else other than any Cuban official, and has been the basis of the mayor disinformation on this issue. It would surely be easy for the Washington Post also to find out the truth by simply contacting the people that the editorial cites as having visited Mr Gross in prison: The Cuban Jewish leaders, whose community enjoys every benefit when it comes to communications that a country under so much limitations in that regard can give them.
Well before the arrest of Mr Gross the Group on Arbitrary Detentions of the United Nations Humans Right Commission, Amnesty International, more than a hundred Brithish MP's, ten Nobel price winners, the entire Mexican Senate, 56 Canadian MP's and thousands of personalities, political and civil organizations all over the world called for an end to the vindictive and arbitrary treatment of the Five. It would have taken any news outlet, including the Post, to just read the decision of the Appellate panel on the 11th Circuit -August 5, 2005-, where the terrorist activities against Cuba which we were watching on are listed, to explain why so many people support us.
That also explains the reasons of my incapacity to give you my mailing address or telephone number. After all, during my sentencing, the prosecutors asked the Judge
-who granted it- that "the defendant should be prohibited from associating with terrorists or to visit places where it is known that terrorists, people who promote violence or organized crime figures meet". They forgot, nevertheless, to offer me the same protection against the terrorists, who enjoy any freedom to come after me if they only new my location.
Some times bad actions have unintended consequences, and this applies now. Every one of those who decided to spill on the five of us his hatred towards the Cuban government, now has put that same government on a position when it would be impossible for him to exercise the generosity that -to take just an example- was exercised with the Bay of Pigs invaders. I have nothing personal against Mr Gross and wish him well, but it is not wise -as suggested by the editorial- to think that the recycling of the same arrogance and lies will do him any good. It doesn't make sense to mistreat somebody and at the same time demand generosity from him. That logic should come to an end, the sooner the better for our two peoples.
I respectfully suggest that there is still time for the Post to take this matter seriously. Open a real debate on all this issues and don't keep going down the same worn out path that goes nowhere.
It reads in the Bible that "the truth will set you free". That might apply to Mr Gross today.
Respectfully submitted.
René González Sehwerert
Copyright 2012 Sting of the Wasp: The Cuban Five Connection
-
About
This is the site for What Lies Across the Water: The Real Story of the Cuban Five, collected research and other materials for an in-progress narrative nonfiction book about the Cuban Five by Stephen Kimber.
The Cuban Five were members of "La Red Avispa"—the Wasp Network—spies Havana dispatched to Florida in the early 1990s to infiltrate militant anti-Castro exile groups that Cuba believed were plotting terrorist attacks on its soil. The Cuban Five were arrested, tried, convicted and sentenced to long prison terms in the United States.
In the United States, they are virtually unknown. In Cuba, they are heroes.
That’s the short version of the story. The long version is… well, more complicated... Stay tuned.
Subscribe
