The Bush administration's war on terror pointedly ignores home-grown anti-Castro terrorists, writes Faiza Rady The struggle against United States-sponsored terror topped the agenda of the International Conference against Terrorism that convened in Havana on 2-3 June. "This was an important conference because it addressed the Bush administration's double standards regarding its ongoing 'war on terror'," Cuban ambassador to Egypt, Angel Dalmau Fernàndez told Al-Ahram Weekly. "It was an exceptional event," said Cuban President Fidel Castro. "We are fighting for life and independence and against the domination that the US superpower is attempting to impose in our hemisphere." This is especially relevant to my country, said Venezuelan Vice- President José Vicente Rangel, who alleged that the US is conspiring to assassinate Venezuelan President Hugo Chàvez, whose life, Rangel believes "is in grave danger". Fidel condemned the US policy of aggression against Afghanistan and Iraq in particular, and the Bush administration's hypocrisy in waging an all-out rhetorical war against terror, while affording shelter and protection to convicted terrorists Luis Posada Carriles and Orlando Bosch. A renowned terrorist of international stature, Posada's most recent claim to fame includes a botched attempt to assassinate Fidel in August 2000 in Panama, where the Cuban president was attending an Iberian-American summit. Detained and convicted for endangering public safety, a lesser charge than the attempted assassination of a head of state, Posada remained behind bars until last year. Outgoing Panamanian president, Mireya Moscoso, pardoned Posada in August 2004. Following a brief interlude in Mexico, Posada crossed over to the US in March and applied for political asylum in April. Facing international and domestic outrage for harbouring a man even the FBI labels as a terrorist, the Bush administration declined to take action. Instead, the US attempted to buy time claiming they had no information concerning his whereabouts. It was only after an estimated one million Cubans marched against terrorism and US double standards on 17 May, demanding that Posada be brought to justice, that the US Department of Homeland Security finally moved to arrest Posada. A Cuban exile and a CIA henchman in the 1960s and 1970s, Posada and fellow Cuban terrorist Orlando Bosch were tried and convicted in Venezuela on charges of masterminding the downing of Cubana Flight 455. The DC-8 exploded in mid-air near Barbados on 6 October, 1976, killing all 73 people on board. After serving nine years of his sentence, Posada managed to bribe Venezuelan prison officials with money from the extremist Miami- based Cuban American National Foundation (CANF). In 1985, he walked out a free man. Posada resurfaced in Havana in 1997, where -- by his own admission -- he engineered terrorist attacks against tourist facilities. The bombing of Havana's Cubacabana Hotel on 4 September, 1997, killed Italian tourist Fabio De Shilmo and injured six others. Besides killing innocent civilians -- "a freak accident" in Posada's words -- his stated aim was to crush Cuba's booming tourist industry, the country's main source of hard currency. In a 12 July 1998 interview with The New York Times, Posada admitted to having organised "a wave of bombings the previous year in Cuban hotels, restaurants and discotheques". He also revealed that the bombings were again generously bankrolled by the CANF. While Posada is widely considered a master of his trade, notwithstanding a few bungled jobs, others in the employ of the CIA also excelled in the business of destabilising Latin American countries. Special Presidential Envoy for Latin America in the Security Council, Otto Reich, has, in fact, made a career out of creating, training and funding Contra armies and overthrowing democratically-elected governments. One of his more recent achievements was to finance and mastermind the Venezuelan opposition's coup against President Chàvez. Reich first established his credentials during his tenure as US ambassador to Venezuela where he served from 1986 to 1989. This is where he ties in with fellow CIA agent and career terrorist Orlando Bosch, Posada's accomplice in downing Cubana Flight 455. An accomplished diplomat, Reich handled the Bosch case with finesse. Using his connections with the Venezuelan judiciary, Reich engineered a bizarre appeals process for Bosch which ultimately acquitted him of complicity in the airline bombing. Arrested in Miami as an "undesirable alien" and a "parole-violating terrorist", he was pardoned by President George Bush senior in 1990 -- presumably because of services rendered. Now retired, Bosch lives in Miami enjoying life in the Sunshine State. Reich's claim to fame was based on his disinformation campaign against the democratically-elected Sandanista government in Nicaragua. Promoted to the post of director of Public Diplomacy at the US State Department under CIA cover in 1981, he proceeded to swamp the US media with colourful fabrications about the "Sandanista threat", a widely- circulated version of which concerned the alleged launching of Soviet-made MIG fighter planes against the US. Reich also used his creative skills to malign Cuba. The idea was to provoke an armed conflict between Cuba and the US, says Fidel. During his short-lived appointment as Assistant US Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs in 2002, Reich launched a well-orchestrated mud-slinging campaign against the Caribbean island. "Outrageous claims rained down," comments Fidel. "One day they would say that Cuba was planning electronic warfare against communication networks in the US; and the next, that a Chinese ship loaded with weapons was headed for Cuba. They also said Cuba was developing a research programme to develop biological weapons." Reich's 2002 propaganda warfare against Cuba was duly taken up by his appointee to the position of chief of the US Interest Section in Havana, James Cason. Cason, who worked under Reich's supervision in the American Affairs Department in the 1980s, had learnt all about disinformation techniques during the Nicaragua campaign. Upon assuming his post, Cason proceeded to set his agenda for "hastening Cuba's transition to democracy". Even before introducing himself to the Cuban leadership, he met members of the opposition, telling them "the doors of his home were open to them" and that he was "willing to collaborate, finance and serve in whatever [capacity] was necessary." Cason's first task was to create a network of "independent" journalists who were instructed to write articles defaming Fidel. This anti- Castro propaganda campaign, specifically targeted Latin and South American audiences, with the intent of eroding the broad-based support Fidel enjoys in those countries. Cason's media assistants referred to the fledging group of "independent" journalists as "the future children of the US in a Cuba with a democratic press". Although bankrolled and propped up by Cason, the "independent" journalists have not yet managed to achieve their aim. Thus a much-touted "historic" rally in Havana on 21 and 22 May, that was supposed to produce a turnout of 360 dissident NGOs, barely managed to scrape up 200 people. "These so-called dissidents have no base in Cuba, they only represent themselves," Ambassador Fernàndez told the Weekly. "We don't refer to them as 'dissidents' or as the 'opposition', instead we call them 'mercenaries' because they are all on CIA payroll."
