9 Ways for us to Talk to Cuba & for Cuba to Talk to us

When 2008 ended, and leaders from thirty-three Caribbean and Latin American nations met in Brazil and called for an end to our embargo against Cuba, this report took on a special urgency. The nations of the Americas have never challenged our Cuba policy with such clarity or unanimity. And they are not alone. Our allies in Europe, Asia, and Africa condemn the embargo every year. Growing majorities of Americans — even in Miami, Florida — want the policy changed. There are great expectations, here and around the world, that President Obama will make history by ending this failed and futile policy once and for all. But even if the case for normalizing relations is overpowering, the obstacle that has always stopped progress still seems overwhelming. These two governments don’t trust each other. And how could they? Washington and Havana have been shouting at each other, talking past each other, and, most of all, threatening each other, for fifty years. If our politicians and diplomats can’t even conduct a simple dialogue that builds trust between them, real progress — and, ultimately, reconciliation — will be impossible.

We know how to get that conversation started. The Center for Democracy in the Americas has spent most of the last decade bringing Cuban and American politicians together. Our Freedom to Travel campaign has led more than thirty delegations to Cuba, enabling Republicans and Democrats, five Senators and twenty-eight Representatives, and thirty Congressional staff to visit the island, many for the first time. Some were harsh critics of Cuba, communism, and the Castros. Others knew our policy failed and had sullied America’s image in the region. But nearly all were astounded by the openness of the Cuban people, and the increasing willingness of Cuban officials to talk frankly — often aggressively — about the most divisive issues that separate our systems and societies. Every delegation we’ve taken to Cuba has returned to the United States believing in direct engagement. They only ask: How can this process be formalized? That is the aim of this report. We recruited an exceptional team of experts to identify problems in their fields especially where Washington and Havana have mutual interests in finding solutions for them. In their essays, our authors tell remarkable stories about a rich fabric of shared concerns and a long history of collaboration — such as joint medical research that predates the Spanish-American war; fence talks between Cuban and American soldiers on Guantanamo; overflights by U.S. hurricane hunters to predict extreme weather; piecemeal partnerships between our Coast Guards. They also show how often politics intruded and stopped real progress in its tracks. Our writers then offer a succession of proposals for cooperation in military affairs and law enforcement, health research and hurricane preparedness, energy development and migration policy, commerce and academic exchange, and for reuniting Cuban families — to build trust back into the U.S.-Cuba relationship. Most of these ideas require nothing more than political will to implement them.

We’re not recommending talk for its own sake. Cooperation in these fields will give political leaders in both countries the confidence they need to close this fifty-year chasm of mistrust, so we can finally engage in the difficult negotiations that will bring this conflict to an end. This is how President Obama can break the diplomatic deadlock with Cuba. Of course, the last defenders of the embargo will try and stop him. They’ll disparage the very idea of talking to Cuba. They’ll call it capitulation to communism. They’ll warn Obama: “If you talk to the Castros today, they will deceive you or embarrass you tomorrow.” For them, Cuba is a problem without a solution. But they’re wrong. For more than a generation, American soldiers and scientists, academics and activists, never stopped trying to keep the conversation going, and they overcame the resistance of American policy and domestic politics to build productive relationships with their Cuban counterparts. Now is the time for their government to join them. It is time for us to talk to Cuba. This is the course that President Obama should follow. Set aside the Cold War hatreds and the rhetoric; and step by step, let a free exchange of ideas lead to normalized travel and trade, and then offer the United States and Cuba the chance to live together as neighbors. Were he to take this step, the impact would be dramatic, and not just on the island. Ending the embargo would be an unmistakable signal to Latin America that the United States will no longer view the region through the Cuba lens, and it will also send a powerful message that our nation is ready to embrace this world not as we found it in 1959 but as it exists today.