Open letter to the State Department

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson,

About the new Task Force of the United States on the Internet for Cuba.

The creation of an Internet Task Force for our country, has all the signs of being one more error of your administration. Political bullying has never been a healthy or fair foreign policy against anyone, much less against Cubans. Cuba does not understand pressures, not only as State policy but also because of national idiosyncrasy. Our island does not need the United States plotting another project for the imposition of its political preferences. If the United States wants to promote access to the Internet in Cuba, our countries do not need unilateral acts outside of international law, but honest and unconditional attempts to get technology to a highly qualified and underutilized country because of the blockade situation in which your own hostile policy has placed us.

It’s time for sanity. Cubans have seen how the achievements in normalizing bilateral relations during the second administration of President Barack Obama, are undermined by a childish policy complacent with a selfish electoral sector in Florida contrary to the interests of the Cuban and American peoples. All actions since June 2017 lack empathy with Cubans on the island. Subordinating ethics, even what is consensus in the State Department and your own diplomats know that it is the right thing to do, to an exchange of favors with Marco Rubio and a group of electors, is a historical shame.

Requiring Cuba to behave as a democracy of peace when subjected to a state of unconventional war, is at least a hypocrisy

With you there are already 18 Secretaries of State in your country trying to change the regime in Cuba. A military invasion supported by his office was not achieved, Operation Mongoose could not do it, not even the systematic suffocation of the Cuban economy has generated any kind of tropical rebellion. The culture of resistance is part of our character. The changes we make in Cuba, which must be many because there is much that remains to be changed, will be in our terms. Your policy of harassment only causes the obstruction of internal changes, and the subordination of these changes to national defense.

Thanks to people and institutions that promote these failed policies (as it seems to be this Task Force), Cubans of our generation have only known a life of warnings against the blockade and an imperial policy. We have had very little room for a discussion of our own, without your interventions, to innovate, to dare to do something different in all respects, to change what is necessary. We are not the center of the world, but we are a country to respect. It is regrettable that instead of having a national policy worthy of Cuba, your administration “gives it away” to pressure groups in South Florida, which are already a minority even among the Cuban diaspora.

Cubans are used to fight for our sovereignty, we have done it for many generations

It turns out that the United States is not the only country that has a sense of patriotism and pride, as Barack Obama acknowledged during his visit to Cuba. This conflict is an imposition. It is unnecessary, but we have had to live this way because our respect for the political preferences of the United States is not reciprocated towards our country. We end by recalling the words of Benito Juárez: “Among individuals, as among nations, respect for the rights of others is peace…” That is valid for governments, societies and states in the international arena. International public opinion, history and Cubans in particular, will judge your actions.