The secrets landed on Brian Latell's CIA desk from just about everywhere: spy satellite photos, reports from infiltrators in the Cuban government, communications intercepts, U.S. spies debriefing Cuban intelligence officers begging for asylum. The analyst would weigh each, assign levels of urgency, then pass the scoops up the U.S. chain of command, where top officials from the secretary of state to the president used them for decades to formulate Cuba policy and to try to understand Cuban leader Fidel Castro. Today, eight years into his retirement from his post as a top intelligence official in charge of Latin America and Cuba, Latell is using his analyst skills to decipher another complex place: Miami.
Read more about this Friday in the paper and in this blog.
Since this government and the Cubans in the US have prevented any real American interaction or presence in Cuba since 1959, whoever replaces Castro will continue down their own path unobstructed. To think otherwise is folly!
A very poor American Cuban policy and the unrestricted human flow out of that 3rd World country insures that Castro's legacy will live on. Life goes on in Miami with the only effort being expended on Cuba Libre is lip service and chasing insignificant Cuban "spies." The Cubans on this side of the Straits are here to stay and become part of the Melting Pot. Life goes on.................
Posted by: James D. | June 01, 2006 at 10:41 PM
tough shit, win an election and maybe yoru policies will be enacted.
Posted by: Cuban Patriot | June 02, 2006 at 12:22 AM
"Win an election"? The Idiot Shrub stole the last two elections.
And speaking of policies, just how long is an embargo supposed to take to topple a government? It's been almost 50 years.
Posted by: Miami_Liberal | June 02, 2006 at 03:00 AM
Life in Kendall with a cellphone and SUV is much more safe and comfortable. What "patriotism."
Posted by: Susan | June 02, 2006 at 06:21 AM
wow, a whole new bunch of sour grapes to squeeze... this oughta be fun.
James D- agree, except for the "unrestricted flow out of Cuba" part. it is true the beard has threatened to "open the gates" a la Mariel in 79, but for the most part, flow out of cuba is highly restricted and otherwise highly illegal.
miami liberal- i guess you would have counted the votes differently? do liberals have some special kind of math the rest of us are not aware... OK, OK, let's try it this way...STEAL YOUR OWN ELECTION AND THEN YOU CAN TALK. Otherwise...
susan- life in Kendall??? is THAT where everybody went? dang...
Posted by: nonee moose | June 02, 2006 at 06:43 AM
Nonee moose: STEAL YOUR OWN ELECTION AND THEN YOU CAN TALK. Otherwise
Actually, Cubans will come to regret their support for George W. Bush as the backlash is real against Miami Cubans. Maybe not in Miami, but when Cubans step into any large Democratic run city, its not wise for any Cuban to boast about stealing the Florida election for Bush. This would not be the case if Bush was popular. What the Miami Cubans did in 2000 for Bush is nothing to be proud of. As their actions will come back to haunt Cubans is ways they could never imagine.
Posted by: John Longfellow aka Lou Dobbs | June 02, 2006 at 08:26 AM
Nonee moose,
Ah, another point im not so sure liberals are that liberal anymore. If you watch the hated liberal CNN. You will see that conservative Lou Dobbs has been hardening a lot of liberals against immigrations. CNN liberal voice used to the one of tolerance and moderation. But now CNN seems to have a conservative tilt. So relax before you know it liberals will be walking and talking just like conservatives. Your main battle will be against the rising tide of conservative anger at anything that speaks with a Spanish tongue. Of course you wont see this until you leave Spanish Miami.
Posted by: John Longfellow aka Lou Dobbs | June 02, 2006 at 08:33 AM
A.T.
If you have noticed i have not spoken to you for several days. And i think you know why. I will give you several more days to reflect upon your inappropriate behavior. Then i will fully explain to you why this immigrant type behavior is very disturbing to me.
Posted by: John Longfellow aka Lou Dobbs | June 02, 2006 at 08:46 AM
John, I have no clue why you are mad at me. Other than that I haven't emailed you pics of my toes.
Nonee, you seem to have made some new friends here, so allow me to help you upset the apple cart some more.
Life in Kendall can be very pleasant, save for the traffic. What would you have the "patriots" doing, Susan? Running around screaming about Castro? Then liberals and conservatives alike would point fingers and say, "There they go again." Damned if you do...you know the rest. We cannot just invade Cuba; that was already tried and it turned into a fiasco when Kennedy called back the air support. The U.S. is probably at the lowest point of its popularity ever in the world, due to the war in Iraq. I'm not saying whether I'm for or against the war, I'm just saying it has caused us to lose quite a few Brownie points. I do, however, solidly support the American heroes over there fighting while the rest of us sit here and enjoy the freedoms they are ensuring for us, wherever they are in the world.
Can you imagaine the reaction of the world if we just decide the Cuba is a threat and take over? We cannot invade Cuba. Does that make people any less patriotic? If we push for an invasion, we are called warmongers. If we argue and discuss, we are dismissed as apathetic blowhards. Damned if you do....
Posted by: a thought.... | June 02, 2006 at 09:07 AM
loujohn:
as i have posted before, i can accept that the elian issue, timing-wise, could possibly be credited, as much as anything can, with a 537 vote margin in florida. a rhetorical question to the political theoreticians out there: was it the first 537, or the last 537 that made the difference? Cuz I know all the Cubans, and they swore up and down they voted in the middle 537... or was it the 14th 537?
what i will not accept is your characterization of those votes as anything more or less than anyone else did in that election, which was to vote their self interest--- the American way.
persisting in plotting your vengeance against the Cuban community for their purported role in a close election would smack of mere sour grapes coming from anyone else. to them i say bring it on -- the American way.
coming from you however, those threats of vengeance are just what i needed with my morning coffee... you're funnier than "In the Bleachers"
loujohn, you have acne, don't you...
Posted by: nonee moose | June 02, 2006 at 09:17 AM
after almost half a century does anyone think that things are going to change overnite? with a very polarized gusano-nangara ambiance still affecting much of the Havana-Miami complex, dialogueros promoting their wares from the comfort of their business or academic positions and the rest of us watching the human comedy, nothing is going to happen soon. It may also be that the insulars will delay announcing Fidel's demise as long as possible to the peninsulars while they make last minute preparations just as Miami-Dade officials will be doing, too, the rest is just anticlimatic hype...Anyway you look at it it's going to be a mess, not much cause for rejoicing any more...If your grandpappy owned one of those centrales that have been shut down, I want to see you going down and sharing your stake with a couple of hundred other cousins, in-laws and what-nots. Look at that ridiculous show the University of Miami put on recently to "simulate" Fidel's passing, the old devil must have laughed his butt off at such immature academicians. If, turning to the other side, many of the insulars cross the straits looking for hand me downs they are in for a surprise, since people here live to work, not work to live and the freebies are mostly gone after 45 years...Good luck to y'all speculators (that's rite specious culators !
Posted by: rosa | June 02, 2006 at 09:46 AM
rosa (good one on the email addy, i think i heard that name in school once):
that would be mess with a capital 'M'... as for the speculation, one theory is just as valid as another, i guess, based on what passes for information these days. academicians are academicians, they speculate, a lot like the espn guys do in the pregame...
Posted by: nonee moose | June 02, 2006 at 10:07 AM
Cuba will transition on its own to another dictatorship. Americans aren't about to shed any blood over it, especially after Bush's latest blunder.
The ancestors of Cuban Exiles will remain comfortably in the US, like others have said. Life in Amerika goes on.
Funny how someone has to start labeling (liberals, etc.) when it comes to these issues. No labels, just brains! One attempt 45 years ago and an ongoing foreign policy failure is no excuse. Failure to do better is more realistic.
Posted by: J.D. | June 02, 2006 at 10:30 AM
JD-
Explain "Amerika" for me... so I can label you. LOL
Posted by: nonee moose | June 02, 2006 at 11:18 AM
Explain 47 years of Red Cuba!
Posted by: Jimmie | June 02, 2006 at 11:43 PM
Jimmie? as in the sausage dude? you're on the wrong thread... the raul castro thread is a little farther up the road. Enjoy.
Posted by: nonee moose | June 03, 2006 at 09:37 AM
As the days of the Castro brothers come to an end, isn't it sad that all forms of American interaction and presence in Cuba has been prevented by blind people in Miami. The next Cuban dictator will proceed down his own path with little internal interference.
Posted by: Will | June 03, 2006 at 10:58 AM
Will, you are too perceptive for these folks.
Posted by: James D. | June 04, 2006 at 03:54 PM
will, whenever you post one of those terse little nuggets of yours, i read it with the voice of john facenda in my head... the frozen tundra of lambeau field...
you should try it... it's pretty funny.
Posted by: nonee moose | June 05, 2006 at 08:53 PM