Talk:Fidel Castro/Archive 1

message: "Hideous image"? I thought it was a pretty good shot of him. I'll admit that the protocolary foliage in the background clashes a bit with the fatigues, but it's recognizably Fidel, in a nice, tight close-up shot -- and not that unflattering, either, for a man of almost 80 with a beard. –Hajor 14:26, 19 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: As it is the page has enough images. But if you insisted, I could readily find a recent picture in which he didn't appear ready to keel over. 172 06:48, 20 Mar 2004 (UTC)

text: I'll get on it. I know that your intentions have been well placed, but doesn't itlook like he's about to croak in that pic? 172 15:48, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)

text: That's not what I've been hearing, e.g., read this: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/040313/481/hav10803130305 172 16:34, 22 Mar 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I always heard this as vinceremos; this sounds like somebody trying to translate an English translation back into Spanish" :-) Eclecticology 22:31, 2004 Apr 4 (UTC)
Nah -- it was me trying to pull off a lame wordplay between "venceremos" (we shall overcome) and "sobreviviremos" (we shall survive). Although, with all the references to Krushchev here, perhaps it should be "sepultaremos"... –Hajor 20:01, 5 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Hideous image

message: Is Castro a dictator? I think so, and so do many people, but phrases like "iron-fisted" aren't helping the case for NPOV.  Why not just describe what he does and let the reader decide for himself? Any accurate portrayal of Castro will lead to the perception of dictatorship, without our shoving it in the readers' faces. Meelar 21:51, 4 Apr 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Explaining my revert

message: In addition to a handful of Cambodia-related articles, another edit war seems to be breaking out. I restored the somewhat stable revision as of 05:36, 19 Apr 2004. 172 09:37, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: (a) It was hardly at an "edit war" yet; while Eclecticology was being rather rude, neither of us had fully reverted yet.  (b) 172 has been heavily involved in the history of this page and should not be protecting it. -- VV 10:07, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure, everyone else is the devil. Discuss the content with Ec now, not whether or not he's rude. 172 10:53, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Do you not understand English? -- VV 11:04, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I do. Sin embargo, comprendo español también. ¿Quiere Ud. que yo hable español en vez de inglés? 172 12:08, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Entonces, muéstreme.  Otra vez, ¿qué dije antes?  (A propósito, prefiero inglés.) -- VV 21:08, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Protecting page

message: :In a personal letter to Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev writen on October 27 1962 [http:// www.historyofcuba.com/history/Crisis/ Cltr-2.htm], Castro urged Khrushchev to take a nuclear first stike against the United States if Cuba were invaded, but Khrushchev rejected any first strike response ~nsarchiv/nsa/cuba_mis_cri/ 621030%20Letter%20to%20Castro.pdf.
What's wrong with putting this in the article? --Uncle Ed 12:50, 23 Apr 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't forget first strike. --Uncle Ed 19:01, 23 Apr 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: A piece of deleted text

message: The Library of Congress'  Revelations from the Russian Archives site says that:
:According to Nikita Khrushchev's memoirs, in May 1962 he conceived the idea of placing intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Cuba as a means of countering an emerging lead of the United States in developing and deploying strategic missiles. He also presented the scheme as a means of protecting Cuba from another United States-sponsored invasion, such as the failed attempt at the Bay of Pigs in 1961. 
:After obtaining Fidel Castro's approval, the Soviet Union worked quickly and secretly to build missile installations in Cuba.
This suggests the missiles were K's idea rather than Castro's. Do we know when Raul and Che visited Moscow? Also, what is the source that says the nukes were a Cuban idea?AndyL 20:20, 7 May 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Late in April, 1962, while vacationing in the Crimea, across the Black sea from Turkey, Khrushchev realizes the nuclear tipped knife that is at the throat of the Soviet Union. To ensure a deterrent, Khrushchev considers deploying nuclear weapons to Cuba to prevent a full U.S. invasion. While the United States had nuclear missiles all around the world and on the very borders of the Soviet Union, the Soviet Union had only 10 - 25 nuclear missiles capable of reaching the United States. Upon returning to Moscow, Khrushchev discusses the idea with First Deputy Prime Minister Anastas Mikoyan. Although Mikoyan is skittish and opposed, Khrushchev asks a group of his closest advisers, including Frol Kozlov, Commander of the Strategic Rocket Forces (SRF) Sergei Biryuzov, Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko , and Marshal Malinovsky to evaluate the idea. The group proposes that a mission be sent to Cuba to see if Fidel Castro would agree to the proposed deployment. 
 
So it seems that K came up with the idea in April or May, Raul and Che visited in July and agreed. Now, of course, its possible the Cubans had independently come up with the same idea but still it seems to have been K's initiative rather than the Cubans. AndyL 22:32, 7 May 2004 (UTC)

text: No. The evidence is that Khrushchev came up with the idea in late April or early May 1962 cleared it with his own military and then invited the Cubans to Moscow in July to make the proposal. That's quite different from speculating that it "mutually" came up in July. Unless you can find evidence to the contrary I think we should base ourselves on the evidence we have. AndyL 00:38, 8 May 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Nukes

message: I am trying to find whether Fidel Castro actually said something to the effect that "Organization of American States is the USA's colonial office".  Help?! -- Kaihsu 21:41, 2004 Jul 12 (UTC)
:The article at the site http://wais.stanford.edu/UnitedNations/un_unanddialogamongcivilizations11201.html suggests that this term goes back to the late 40s and thus predates Castro
::"How will this affect the UN? New York Mayor Edward Koch asked the UN to leave New York because of its criticism of Israel. When Jesse Helms was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the US had a very negative attitude toward the UN. Recently, to get support in the fight against terrorism, President Bush has changed its tune toward the UN. We know that many in the world hate the IMF and the World Bank. They may support the UN, but what do they think about its being in New York? Bienvenido Macario suggests a site in the Philippines. Graham Stuart of Stanford argued that it should be in Tangiers (then an independent territory) in order to have it in neutral territory. Another Stanford professor used to argue that the OAS should be moved from Washington to Panama to shake off the label "US colonial office". Americans protested vehemently and it stayed put. Do foreigners regard the UN as likewise US dominated? Probably. Clarification of this would be appreciated. There may be a move to transfer the headquarters of the UN to Geneva, where it has important facilities."
:In another article http://wais.stanford.edu/USA/us_panamacanal1.html he attributes the comment to Tim Brown in 1944. The reference was more correctly applied to the Pan-American Union, the predecessor organization of the OAS. 
:The article http://www.hichumanities.org/AHproceedings/Bernard%20Lemelin.pdf quotes a New York Times editorial that suggest that Castro also used the term in 1974.  Eclecticology 23:40, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Fidel Castro]]?: "[[Organization of American States]] is the [[USA]]'s colonial office" 

message: I shortened the text about homosexuals. Removed version is below:
:Thousands of those labeled as "mentally disabled" were actually homosexuals imprisoned by Castro. The Cuban government saw homosexuality as a social pathology that reflects leftover bourgeois decadence and used the boat lift as an opportunity to purge the island of all the homosexuals it had imprisoned.
The text created a false impression that Castro's repressions of homosexuals were somehow special and unique (and therefore very bad). 
:: They are special and unique. Homosexuals in Cuba were sent to prison as part of official state policy and sent to UMAP camps, 4 years in a UMAP if one was simply suspected of bieng gay. Nothing like that existed anywhere in the world, or at least in the West, durign that time. TDC 22:04, Jul 27, 2004 (UTC)
But, as a matter of fact, in 1980 discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation was legal in every state in the US. And it has been only seven years after the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from the official list of mental disorders. The text I removed tried to not very subtly blame Castro for prejudice, intolerance, etc. I guess that if Cuban homosexuals fought for their rights, they would have gotten them earlier than their friends in the US. But it just happened that there was no gay rights movement in Cuba and you can't blame Fidel for not thinking "why don't we do something good for homosexuals". As for the claim that some of the people in the boat lift were homosexuals, of course, there is no reason to remove this fact. Paranoid 19:42, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: First it was 20000 including some gays, not it's 25000 gays. On a more serious note, my point was that prosecution of gays did not happen because Castro was evil, it happened because Castro (and Cuban society/government/party/etc.) was misguided, just like people in the US/UK/everywhere else. Yes, these were terrible mistakes. Yes, Castro was a bit slow in recognizing gay rights. But prosecuting gays was normal everywhere just a few decades ago. And treating them with even "Excisions of specific portions of the frontal lobes" was fine too. So the fact that Cuba prosecuted gays does not belong in the passage about the boat lift in the article about Castro. Paranoid 23:48, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Homosexuals

message: I found it funny the first time I read the word "non-partisan". I find it even more funny after your reply. There is more to politics than Democrats vs. Republicans. :) Freedom House may be "non-partisan" in the USian sense, but it is clearly biased against Cuba and for United States. Left/right wings (as they are perceived in the US) are completely irrelevant here. Cuba is not a tyranny and there is nothing brutal about imprisoning 320 people (out of 11 million) for political reasons. If that's brutal, how is imprisoning hundreds of thousands for smoking pot? Of course, when the USA does it, it gets "1,1,Free".
You call the American elections democratic, but it never occurs to you  (or to Freedom House, or to most Americans) that there is no big difference between elections in Cuba and elections in the USA. In the USA you only have two candidates, there are no direct elections and the whole process is corrupted from top to bottom (via legalised bribes known as "campaign contributions"). In Cuba you have one candidate (because Castro has unprecedented level of popular support), no direct elections and the whole process is to a large extent controlled by the people. President Bush challenges Cuba to have fair and open elections. But United Nations challenges the USA to have open elections and allow UN representatives to monitor them (true fact).
Here is a useful link comparing election systems in Cuba and the USA:
http://www.cubanow.net/culture/Eng/num16/03.htm
(same here: http://www.pww.org/article/articleview/5111/1/211 )
Some quotes from Cuba: A Revolution In Motion, Fernwood Books, 2003 by Isaac Saney: "these [(1993, 1998 and 2003)] elections were open to foreign observers, that 90 percent of the electorate voted, that no one was forced to vote, and that the election was by secret ballot.", "The 1991 Congress (immediately after the economic collapse) was preceded by discussions involving 3.5 million Cubans from 89,000 meetings directly raising 500 issues and concerns ranging from the structure of the Party to foreign policy."
"Cuban electorate is divided into 14,948 districts consisting of a few hundred people each. Each district elects a representative. Mass organizations, labor unions, women's groups and student associations form commissions, which spend over a year selecting candidates to guarantee that all of Cuban society is represented in provincial and national assemblies."
"Communist Party, per se, is prohibited from participating in the candidate selection process"
"[National Assembly] Candidates are not permitted to campaign through the media."
Another great article comparing elections in Cuba and the USA:
http://myweb.cableone.net/danlouis/bush_&_castro.htm
and a large section on The Cuban Political and Electoral System (with lots of information that should be incorporated into our article)
And also Castro gets sixth term unopposed from CNN.
OK, that was number one. Number two - personal freedoms. Frredom to worship is not worthy IMO, and I'd rather have atheistic Cuba than wacko religious US. In any case, there is limited freedom of worship in Cuba now. The media in the USA is not free, they are controlled by a small number of companies that have close ties with the political elite. Free speech is being eroded gradually. I do agree though, that for the time being the situation with the press and speech in the US is still quite decent. Citizens in every country have freedom from illegal prosecution. Every political prisoner in Cuba was prosecuted legally, according to the laws of his country. Third, economic freedom. This is irrelevant, because Cuba is a socialist country. Complaining about lack of economic freedom in Cuba is the same as complaining about the lack of social safety net in the USA. Different countries - different systems.
Detainees of Guataname are not charged with anything. They just sit there in prison. BTW, political prisoners in Cuba are also often accused of sabotage, attempts to subvert the government, etc. Things that are merely "thought crimes" are not prosecuted in Cuba.
The rest is again complaining that there are few political freedoms in Cuba. Well, that's true, because the system is different. But this is irrelevant. For example, in Russia veterans of the Second World War have free passes for public transportation. Is it the same in the US? Now let's blame the US for lacks of freedom of movement.
The absence of certain political institutes in Cuba is by design. That doesn't mean Cuban people have no voice in determining the laws or government course. They do, and often more directly than in the US.
BTW, a nice quote from Cuban Vice President Carlos Lage: "Each day in the world 200 million children sleep in the streets. Not one is Cuban."
**I'm sorry, paranoid, but I have a problem. How do I respond at all to your loony rant against all the personal, individual liberties I believe derive from my God in Heaven, not the USA or any other nation ?
You lost me, and any other sensible person on this board, when you denigrated Freedom of Religion as an unworthy right. The right of a man or woman to worship the God or gods they perceive (if they even choose to worship God at all) in public and private and without government interference is an ABSOLUTE right of mankind given to us by powers higher than Castro or Bush could ever be.
If Freedom of religion is not protected by a nation, then nothing can truly be protected by said nation, for what are we without our souls?
Because you do not believe in God does not now, nor will ever give you the right to dictate to me where and when and who I may worship. Castro tries to do this, and he is a fool for it. 
You seem to think that I am here to be a propagandist for the U.S. I am not. Because we are the freest, mightiest, most secure nation on the face of the Earth does not mean that we are without wrongdoing. Abortion, Judicial Tyranny, and an incompetent Congress are amongst our usual problems. No, I did not come here to kiss America's butt, but to protect her from the unfounded accusations of an admitted  Castroite. We may not be perfect, but even the blind fools at Amnesty International will admit that we posess a much higher degree of freedom on all levels than communist Cuba.
 
Oh, and the Cuban VP is nothing but a puppet of Castro, as you already know. Quoting him to back up your support for an internationally-recognized repressive communist state is akin to quoting Goering to back up Hitler. And that book from Isaac Saney-Gheesh!  Do you have any non-communist, non-extreme left-wing sources for your outlandish claims or do you simply trust that I'll take Castro's word for it on faith alone (remember, I live in America. I won't get shot here for calling him the brutal communist tyrant he is).  You're probably lost anyway if you think that "Health Care" is a greater human right than the freedom to make one's own economic and lifestyle decisions for themselves.
ANTI-COMMUNIST
That's right, elections in the US are similar to "elections" in Cuba. Mmmhmm. Maybe you're just joking, though (if only)
I shouldn't have completely deleted that paragraph, but it needs to be fixed, as do a few other spots in the article that aren't lies or anything, but seem to be too sympathetic toward Castro or too critical of the US -- that practically ranting paragraph is the worst example -- defending Castro a little too thoroughly, there. Might as well have a detailed American rebuttal. Trey Stone 08:59, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reply on Freedom House 

message: Regarding the biowar section, I think we need a few links (and by links, I mean more than footnotes that I can't see) that prove that Castro's charges may have some weight other than anti-U.S. propaganda (which, considering the quote regarding Czechoslovakia, is a technique he has down pretty well). "Experiments in 1967" don't cut it. At this point the allegations oughta be labelled shaky or not substantiated unless people have a good objective source regarding the matter. J. Parker Stone 23:24, 19 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Biological warfare