76-19-A7
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Cuba I
TranscriptSince the administration announced (in the interest of human rights, no doubt) that we were going to normalize relations with Castro's Cuba, wondrous things have happened. They've beaten us in a basketball game, American businessmen tour Havana, dreaming of branch offices and new sales territories, and the wife of one of them tweaks Fidel's beard and finds him "cute". Senator George McGovern and the Cuban dictator munch ice cream cones together and the Senator discovers Fidel is a personable, well-informed fellow. Apparently, he's better informed than the Senator, who shows no sign of knowing that the 15,000 Cuban mercenaries in Africa are only the tip of an iceberg. "West Watch", quarterly journal of the Council for Inter-American Security says Cuban agents have been active on the continent for more than 10 years and it lists 14 African states where they are operating. British journalist Robert Moss estimates there are more than 20,000 (not 15) in Angola and gives specifics on their Russian arms which include everything from heavy tanks to multiple rocket launches and MIG fighter planes. If all of the testimony available on Cuba's long time support of so-called liberation movements is added up, there are 25 to 30,000 Cubans in Africa, and many hundreds more have operated in the past or still are operating in Jamaica, Panama, Portugal, Vietnam and North Korea. They have trained exiles who attempted to launch guerilla warfare in the Dominican Republic as well as the terrorists who plague Argentina. Bayard Rustin, writing in "New America", a socialist journal, describes Cuba as doing the Soviet's dirty work in Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America. But what should be the most difficult thing for Americans to swallow is the testimony of our own former war prisoners in Vietnam. It is bad enough that we rewarded their years of suffering and their heroism by ducking out on our allies; surely they are entitled to be heard on the subject of Cuba. So far the national press has said nothing about their shocked disbelief that we could be negotiating with Castro. Colonel George E. Day, former P.O.W. and holder of the Congressional Medal of Honor has written that Cuban embassy officials in Hanoi inflicted some of the worst tortures on our men. They sold the North Vietnamese the idea they were experts on brainwashing and could re-educate a dozen American servicement so they would come home preaching the Communist line. When brainwashing failed, they turned to plain brutality. Colonel Day tells of one of our Airmen who was raped, bullied and tortured for 24 hours until his mind was gone. Then he was subjected to electric shock treatments with an antiquated machine that not only left massive burns on his arms and head but also finished off what was left of his brain. He was last seen by his fellow prisoners in October, 1970. Whether murdered or just left to die, he never returned. Colonel Day writes with regard to recognizing Cuba that he is, "appalled, amazed and frightened", that men such as Senator McGovern, Andrew Young and President Carter "would have the uncommon, bad judgement and poor sense of responsibility to Americans to aid the cause of these international outlaws." To forgive is divine but not while Castro is arrogantly declaring (as he did a few weeks ago) that he has no intention of halting his efforts to bring terror and revolution to the World. This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening. |
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