Places like Cuba present a problem before me. One the one hand, they excite me because of the huge potential they hold, culture wise, technology wise, etc. On the other, Cuba is one of the most beautiful places in the world, with amazing creatures and fantastic plant life. It's realitively unspoiled (there was an amazing article in the Smithsonian recently on Cuba, I wish I could show it to you). How much longer would it remain that way if it were to be "opened up"?

I am entirely in favor of liberating Cuba. Maybe we can squeeze it in between Iran and France on George W's list. :)

If by "Liberating" you mean "normalizing relations" then I'd say there's a good chance of success. The best way to destabilize Castro is throwing wide the doors. He can keep the country locked down in part because the US is a convenient scapegoat for everything that's wrong.

Cuba has a long, long history of being screwed over by other countries (the US included) under the guise of liberation. The culture is a strong and proud one -- I think it would be a tremendous mistake, on both a political and moral level, for the US to take an agressive "liberator" role towards Cuba. The country can help itself; we need to stop smacking it down.

I'm not sure anything short of his death will destabilize Castro, since he has shown an uncanny knack for keeping a firm grip on his power. Maybe that's the unofficial policy of the US government right now - just wait for the old coot to die.

A Saddam-style overthrow is probably not necessary, and "throwing wide the doors" would certainly lead to improvements in the daily lives of Cubans and allow the culture to progress. However, it would also make it much easier for Castro to get his hands on weaponry that, while thousands of miles away in the Middle-eastern desert might not pose an imminent threat, being 90 miles off the Florida coast would be potentially huge. As long as Castro continues to rule, I'm not altogether interested in Cuban Missile Crisis II.

I don't think Castro's very interested in Cuban Missile Crisis II either, really. While I'm sympathetic to the whole access-to-weapons issue, right now Cuba's already one of the up and coming biotech powers of the 21st century. They have the capability to *make* deadly viruses as easily as anyone else. That's an internal capability -- they don't need to buy weapons from the US.

The Cuban Missile Crisis left Cuba wedged between the USSR and the USA. Although I think there are definitely other ways to read the conflict, it's my opinion that the event was characteristic of the 'Vassal State' identity Cuba suffered under for centuries. It got the short end of the stick in the USSR's pwer play for the Carribean. This isn't to justify Castro's extraordinarily bad human rights record, just asserting that 'Cuban agression towards the US' is a more than a bit of a paper tiger.

Although the collapse of the USSR has crippled it economically, it's standing on its own at the moment. If the US can find a way to encourage and support self-sufficiency, and welcome the country as a partner on the global stage rather than "that annoying island," I think it could help matters a lot.

Anyhow. Cuba's one of those topics I can rant about for aaaages. ;)

-v