Felipe de J. Pérez Cruz Cuba Dear Comrade Pérez Cruz, Thank you for writing to me regarding the article I circulated by Dr. Susan Williams, “Cuba’s Fate: Balanced on a Razor’s Edge” which first appeared in the Freedom Socialist newspaper. I appreciate the offer to continue debate based on “respect and friendship, as befits comrades who share the same revolutionary ideas.” It seems important since you shared some of your political history with me to let you know a little something about myself. I am a longtime Cuba solidarity activist and led the first Canadian Pastors for Peace Caravan to Cuba. I also played a key role in assisting the International Feminist Brigade to Cuba which openly challenged the blockade during the Special Period. Ten years ago this month, during the World Trade Organization (WTO) meeting in Seattle, I and other members of the Freedom Socialist Party (FSP) played host to the Cuban WTO delegation. During the period of perestroika, I visited Moscow to get a first-hand picture of what was happening. Today I am the National Secretary of the FSP in the United States. First of all, I want to make clear that Dr. Williams’ article reflected the party’s views and fears concerning the potential for the re-emergence of capitalism in Cuba, especially given what has occurred in China and the Soviet Union. Dr. Williams made a year-long study of Cuba at the request of the FSP National Committee. This was followed by discussion within the party. I would agree with you that we do not have all the information we need to grasp the whole situation, but this is not from lack of trying. Obtaining accurate information about the Cuban economy or debates within the PCC is difficult. However, our belief that Raúl Castro is headed in the wrong direction, sharpening the threat of capitalist restoration, is not based on hostility to Cuba’s revolutionary leadership. Our position is based on what we know about divisions within the country’s leadership on the questions of changes in economic policies and practices, data on foreign investments and degree of private ownership, and the ability of unions, women’s and other mass organizations to exert influence on the state apparatus. Dr. Williams is putting the finishing touches on a paper on this topic which I would like to share with you when it is completed. We would like to hear your assessment of our view once you understand it more fully. A problem I see now with the article is that its short length did not allow Dr. Williams to make a complete development of the ideas and gave no indication of our long history in the Cuba solidarity movement in the U.S., Canada and Australia. Its harsh tone in a few spots convinced some readers that we were calling for the political overthrow of the Cuban government. Néstor García Iturbe went so far as to call us agents of imperialism in his article “A Thousand-faced Monster called the CIA”(see our attached response). None of this is true. We are revolutionaries who are, ironically, calling for reform of the present Cuban system—a position that draws fire from all sides we have learned. While we received a number of responses to Dr. Williams’ article, few addressed its main point: “With an economy that has been on life support since the 1990’s, Cuba is trying to survive the current global crisis while it copes with $10 billion in damage caused by last year’s hurricanes. In these circumstances, how much longer can the island stave off capitalism’s return?” Given the re-ascendance of capitalism in China and the Soviet Union, we think this is a relevant question and deserves to be examined and discussed by the world socialist movement. We understand that the isolation of workers states in a global capitalist economy and the endless sabotage of world imperialism are the main causes of these setbacks, but there are also lessons to be learned from these defeats about the nature of state bureaucracies and working people’s desires for the commodities that capitalism produces in the world market. In the early period of perestroika, our party hosted relatively poor Russian artists during the 1990 Goodwill Games held in Seattle. These first-time visitors to the states were amazed at the consumer goods that filled every store. I remember one man walked into a local grocery outlet and, seeing the display of so much food, declared “This is socialism!”
He was right, in a sense: socialism promises to provide everything capitalism does and more! It is the inability of besieged worker states—like China and those in the Soviet bloc—to meet demands for consumer goods and civil liberties which laid the groundwork for the re-installation of capitalism. Privileged bureaucracies also played their role. For instance in the Soviet bloc, many former Communist Party leaders made a miraculously swift transition from Marx to the market, becoming rich and ex-communist almost overnight. It does no good to deny these unhappy facts. Rather it is better to examine them and see what is to be learned. You write that “Working within the Empire must be quite a feat. Everything you can do against capital and for the unity and revolutionary awareness of the American workers and people, and everything you can do against warmongering and the military invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan and to stop the plans to topple Venezuela, Bolivia and the ALBA nations and to bring legality back in Honduras, would be, amongst many others, steps in solidarity with and support for all those who fight against imperialism around the world.” To this I can only reply that our hardworking membership does its best to sow the seeds of revolution by working as open socialists and internationalists in our unions and in the social movements of women, people of color, immigrants and sexual minorities. Of course, we defend the people of the world against imperialism’s wars and economic exploitation; simultaneously we work to integrate all the social struggles with the class struggle here in this country because, in the final analysis, no revolution anywhere will be allowed to flower until there is socialism here in the belly of the beast. We fight, so to speak, with both hands. If you would like to find out more about the Freedom Socialist Party, please visit our web site www.socialism.com. I look forward to hearing from you again and continuing this discussion. Once again, thank you for writing us and sharing your frank opinion. In struggle, Doug Barnes
National Secretary
Freedom Socialist Party, U.S.
