Castro aimed at Reich, but Bush was his target

Carlos Alberto Montaner, The Miami Herald

When President Bush was elected, Fidel Castro perceived that triumph  as a dangerous threat. Bush was the first American president to speak Spanish -- or something like it -- and he swore that his priority was the United States' relations with Mexico and the rest of Latin America.

Earlier, Bill Clinton's two terms had elapsed amid a great  indifference toward the region, a ''benign negligence'' that allowed  Havana to initiate a strong neopopulist trend -- profoundly anti-American -- around the so-called ''Sao Paulo forum,'' an international gathering of pro-communist  political parties and groups that are enemies of the market economy  and democratic rules.

Castro's alarm was short-lived. When Bush appointed his Cabinet,  Castro, who believes himself an ''Americanologist,'' realized that only one  official could become an obstacle to his plans for political  expansion: Undersecretary of State Otto Reich, a Cuban-born diplomat ready to defend Bush's  anti-communist policy.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell seemed to worry only about European and Middle Eastern affairs -- terrorism  had not yet monopolized the attention of American society -- and knew nothing about events in Latin America.

Castro had even read, with much pleasure, a speech made by Powell in  1995 in which the former general advocated a lifting of the embargo and a  later statement where Powell acknowledged the ''positive  accomplishments'' of the revolution.

Clearly, Powell did not have a militantly hostile attitude toward the Cuban dictatorship. Like many other Americans, Powell thought that Castro's death and the passing of time would contribute to solving the conflicts  between the two nations.

This analysis immediately dictated the ''active measures'' taken by  the Cuban government. Castro's strategy was to launch a ''character  assassination'' campaign to ruin Reich's image. That's what Spanish  Army gunners call an ''elevation shot.'' You aim at Reich, but the  real target is Bush.

Without Reich in the State Department, there would be no one to  counteract the offensive against the Free Trade Area of the Americas,  to condemn the Cuban dictatorship or create a coherent response to the  anti-American, anti-market propaganda that flowed from Havana and  spread through the party grapevine organized by Cuba from Mexico to Argentina, with special emphasis in Brazil.

The men assigned to demolish Reich's image were Gen. Eduardo Delgado  Izquierdo, chief of the Interior Ministry's General Directorate of  Intelligence, and Rolando Alfonso Borges of the Central Committee of  the Communist Party. They immediately began to spread defamatory  reports to try to discredit Reich. They accused him of being a ''warmonger,'' a  ''terrorist'' and a ''Miami mafioso.'' Actually, those who knew Reich  in Venezuela, where he was U.S. ambassador from 1986 to 1989, remember  him as a moderate and discreet man who limited himself to carrying out the  instructions of his government.

The attacks against Reich were generated in Havana but were carried  out in the United States by Bush's enemies. One of them was Sen.  Christopher Dodd, D.-Conn., over whose special assistant, Janice O'Connell, Havana hoped  to exert a strong influence. Dodd was insistent on pushing Reich away  from inter-American affairs. He didn't care what other section Reich  could be transferred to. Where Reich got in his way was Latin America.  Other senators, like Michael Enzi, R-Wyo., and Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., sided with Dodd.  Both agreed on one point: They believed that the embargo against Cuba  would be progressively repealed if no one in the State Department were  to defend it, and both came from states that planned to export meat and grain to the island.

Finally, Powell gave in. There had been friction between Powell and  Reich because of a step taken by Reich at the request of an FBI  obsessed with U.S. security: to deny a visa to a Cuban intelligence officer, Pedro  Alvarez, and to expel four Cuban diplomats who maintained a criminal relationship  with an American spy in the Pentagon who reported to Havana. The spy, Ana  Belen Montes, was recently sentenced to 25 years in prison for her  activities.

The FBI wanted to expel 14 Cubans. At the State Department, an  attitude of appeasement prevailed.

When Reich left his job as undersecretary of state for hemisphere  affairs, Cuban officials toasted with rum. The statement attributed to  Castro has the ring of the comandante in a moment of euphoria: ''Bush's hands are now  outside Latin America.'' He didn't even mention Reich. The enemy that needed to be neutralized was Bush.

And Castro has achieved this, unless the president and Powell  recognize the trap they've fallen into.

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