Can you imagine George Bush visiting Fidel Castro for a few days to discuss human rights? Or Condoleezza Rice dropping in to Havana? Can you picture five million U.S. tourists spending time on Cuba’s super beaches? Or $650 million in development assistance to that beleaguered country? Can you conceive of Che Guevara’s daughter receiving a standing ovation in the U.S. Senate?
None of this is likely. Some 45 years since Washington broke diplomatic relations with the Cuban revolution, the level of rhetoric has remained as impassioned (and negative) as ever. Annually U.S. administrations lock horns with the Cuban leadership. Events, real and imagined, trigger off a spiral of animosity, and even the slightest event can serve as a catalyst for bloodcurdling tensions. Before one examines the much calmer relations between Canada and Cuba, it is important to remember just how different they are from those of our neighbours to the south with Havana.
The aggression...
John M. Kirk is Professor of Latin American Studies at Dalhousie University. He is the author or co-editor of some nine books on Cuba, most recently Culture and the Cuban Revolution: Conversations in Havana (University Press of Florida, 2002), and editor of the “Contemporary Cuba” series of the University Press of Florida.
Peter McKenna is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Studies at the University of Prince Edward Island. He is the author of Canada and the OAS: From Dilettante to Full Partner (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1995) and, with John M. Kirk, of Canada-Cuba Relations: The Other Good Neighbor Policy (University Press of Florida, 1997).
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