page_title: J. Paul Austin
section_title: Cuba and Castro
hierarchical_section_title: J. Paul Austin / Politics and personal causes / Cuba and Castro
caption_attribution_description: English: J. Paul Austin, president, CEO and chairman of The Coca-Cola Company meets with Fidel Castro in Cuba, in 1977.
context_page_description: John Paul Austin was Chairman, President and CEO of The Coca-Cola Company. From 1962 to 1981 Austin oversaw the growth of the company from $567 million in sales to a $5.9 billion global force, an unprecedented growth that has not been replicated.
context_section_description: In 1977 and 1978 Paul Austin had a series of private meetings with Fidel Castro in Cuba. The meetings were ostensibly for Coca-Cola business – Coca-Cola had a $27.5 million claim against Cuba for confiscating its properties in 1961.
  Because of Austin's close relationship with President Carter these meetings were also a way to create a dialogue about American-Cuban relations.
  In his White House diary President Jimmy Carter wrote:
  I wanted Paul, as a private citizen, to investigate with Castro the prospects of moving more actively towards reconciliation between the U.S. and Cuba.
  The Austin-Castro-Carter relationship and its link to sugar pricing was the subject of a July 1977 column by William Safire in The New York Times. Playing off of Coca-Cola's slogan, Safire wrote, "The Carter-Coke-Castro sugar diplomacy is not merely a potential conflict of interest. It's the real thing."
caption: J. Paul Austin and Fidel Castro in Cuba
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