‘Adventurism has had its day’: speedboat shootout leaves Miami’s exiled Cubans bewildered | Cuba

FTraffic was slow outside Bay of Pigs Museum on Calle Ocho in Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood. A few tourists in T-shirts and shorts headed to nearby Máximo Gómez Park to take photos of Cuban exiles playing dominoes, bypassing the gallery dedicated to one of the most important days in Cuban history.

This is the street at the heart of the Cuban expatriate community of more than 1 million people, where tens of thousands of people partied through the night to celebrate the death of Fidel Castro in November 2016, and where almost exactly 30 years ago they gathered in grief to mourn the deaths of four Cuban Americans. was shot by the communist country’s air force while conducting a mission for the humanitarian exile group Brothers to the Rescue.

But this week, the mood was more one of curiosity and surprise over news of a gunfight Wednesday at Cayo Falcones, just a mile off Cuba’s north coast, between the Cuban coast guard and 10 heavily armed men aboard a stolen Florida speedboat.

The Cuban government said border officials responded after someone on a speedboat opened fire on them, killing four people and wounding six. The men were said to be dressed in camouflage, were armed with assault rifles, handguns, homemade explosives, ballistic vests and telescopic sights, and were in possession of “a significant number of containers bearing symbols of counter-revolutionary organizations.”

“Didn’t we stop doing this years ago?” While on his coffee break, second-generation Cuban-American office worker Javi González referenced the ill-fated CIA-backed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961 by Cuban paramilitary exiles seeking to overthrow the Castro regime, for which the museum is named.

The mystery deepened as family, friends and acquaintances began to confirm the names of those involved (the list of “terrorists and mercenaries” submitted by Cuban authorities on Wednesday night was at least identified by mistake). a person (who was in south Florida at the time) and a vigil was held in Miami late Thursday.

The tribute was warm and praised “patriots devoted to the cause of freedom.” Prominent Cuban opposition leader José Daniel Ferrer, who was freed last year, shared on social media his “respect and admiration for those assassinated by the Castro-communist tyranny north of Villa Clara.”

But there were few clues as to how the 10 was confirmed by the ministry of state On Thursday night, a mass gathering from various parts of Florida included at least two U.S. citizens, one deceased, and several permanent residents and visa holders. Or why they embarked on such misfortune. Or what they hope to achieve.

One of the four killed was Michel Ortega Casanova, a member of the Casa Cuba de Tampa immigrant group and the city’s branch of the Cuban Republican party. Casanova, a truck driver, was drawn into an “obsessive and demonic” quest for Cuban freedom, his brother Misael told the Associated Press.

“They became so obsessed that they weren’t thinking about the consequences or their own lives,” he said.

It is also unknown who is financing its operations, at least so far. US secretary of state Marco Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, emphasized that the government was not involved and had no knowledge of this incident and would conduct its own investigation “to understand exactly what happened” rather than accept the information provided by Cuba.

Guillermo Grenier, Havana-born sociology professor and Cuban-American Institute “Some people suggest the CIA is involved, but the CIA isn’t doing that. If they want to be there, they get on the plane, they don’t sneak in,” he said, from Florida International University (FIU) in Miami.

The Cayo Falcones effort has parallels in the period immediately after the Cuban revolution in the 1960s, when thousands of exiles organized themselves into a Commando-style group, Grenier said. alpha 66 and held military training in the Florida Everglades, ready to take back their homeland.

It is also reminiscent of more recent, unrealistic “made-in-Miami” coup plots, including a fanciful 2019 plot to kidnap the Venezuelan leader (which the Trump administration accomplished last month) and a 2021 plot to assassinate the Haitian leader using Colombian mercenaries.

But Grenier said the post-revolutionary days were long gone. twenty years Financial Intelligence Unit vote It shows that older, hardline exile groups that traditionally supported the forcible overthrow of the Castro regime are now in favor of a new generation of Cuban Americans connecting with their homeland. I struggled members and maintaining interest.

“Frankly speaking, this kind of approach is anachronistic and not serious,” Grenier said. “There was once a belief in society that armed rebellion would get you where you wanted. But I think there’s a feeling that any kind of adventurism like that has had its day, and that’s nothing serious.”

U.S. policy toward Cuba has been shaky throughout successive presidencies; The preferred tool for bringing about change in the current situation was the economic pressure campaign. US officials on Thursday reportedly met with the grandson of former Cuban president Raúl Castro on the sidelines of Caricom, the annual meeting of Caribbean leaders, in St Kitts and Nevis. Late Friday, Trump confirmed there were talks between the two governments and even suggested the United States could carry out a “friendly takeover” of Cuba.

In Havana, Cuba’s deputy foreign minister and US key man, Carlos Fernández de Cossío, told reporters that lines of communication were open with the US government, which was “willing” to cooperate in clarifying these “regrettable” events.

Grenier said: “They want this story to go away eventually. If the situation doesn’t get more complicated, it won’t preclude any negotiations, and their cold reaction tells me they’re really aware of that. They’re hoping 10 crazy people from Hialeah will go there and decide to start a little revolution from within.”

De Cossio also said in his statement: “Cuba has been the victim of countless terrorist acts and aggressions, mostly organized, financed and carried out on US soil, for more than 60 years.”

This is a position shared by many in Havana. “It’s the same story,” said accountant Hugo Hernandez, walking past the Tribuna Antiimperialista José Martí, the square in front of the U.S. embassy where protests against Cuba’s neighbor are frequent.

“It’s been that way from the very beginning. When I was a teenager in Santa Clara, I had to protect those bays. The coast guard was always worried about someone coming by boat and attacking them.”