For more than 100 years, the island of Cuba, because of its proximity to the United States, has been of particular interest to this country. Now attention again is focusing on Cuba because the man who has led it for 48 years is ill, possibly deathly ill.

For many years Washington has seen events on the island through the distorted prism of what are now the more extreme Miami exiles. Raúl Castro Ruz, who has taken over leadership from his sick brother, is viewed as a drunken, ruthless individual who has ridden on the coat tails of Fidel. Raúl, however, is far too complex a figure to be seen simply as a comic-strip ogre.

Raúl was born 3 June 193l, on his family's sugar plantation in Cuba's eastern Oriente Province, the fourth of seven children. Fidel was an older brother. Raúl was baptized a Catholic and studied at Catholic schools in Oriente and Havana. He went on to the University of Havana where he listened to Fidel's radical ideas and those of Fidel's left-leaning friends.

Raúl may have joined the Partido Socialista Popular, Cuba's communist party. In 1953 he traveled to Vienna to attend the communist-sponsored "International Conference for the Rights of Youth." He then went to another communist conference in Bucharest. Upon his return to Havana on a steamship he was temporarily detained and communist literature he was carrying was confiscated.

On the other hand, a story that has persisted but has not been verifiable is that during the Korean War Raúl went to the U.S. embassy in Havana and volunteered to fight with the United Nations forces.

A former dictator, Fulgencio Batista, staged a successful coup in March 1952. Fidel was soon conspiring to lead an anti-Batista uprising. Raúl joined the conspiracy. On 26 July 1953 the rebels attacked Moncada Fortress in Santiago de Cuba and other strategic points. The Batista troops repelled the assault. Many of the rebels were killed. Others, including the Castro brothers, were captured and brought to trial. The Castros were given 15- year prison sentences.

In May 1955 Batista granted amnesties to a number of political prisoners. The Castros were freed. Within a few months they went to Mexico. There they put together an expedition, which returned to Cuba late in 1956. A two-year guerrilla campaign ensued, with other guerrilla groups also participating. The civil war finally resulted in Batista fleeing and the establishment of a revolutionary government.

On 21 January 1959, Fidel, addressing a mass rally, declared Raúl to be his heir apparent. This has not changed since then. Raúl was also named assistant chief of the armed forces under comandante en jefe Fidel. Later, when Fidel became prime minister, Raúl assumed command of the military establishment and has held that post ever since.

Raúl is a family man. He regularly hosts his relatives at his Havana home. When his sister Juanita broke with Fidel, Raúl enabled her to leave the island safely -- with some 40 pieces of luggage. Raúl himself is divorced from his wife, Vilma Espín, daughter of a Bacardi Company executive and a leader in the Santiago rebel underground.

Raúl can be cruel and ruthless. During the years of guerrilla operations he was probably responsible for more than 100 executions, more than were carried out by all the other rebel commanders combined. On one occasion three prisoners were lined up and blindfolded, ready for the firing squad. The squad fired over their heads. Someone shouted: "You missed one! He's still alive!" Each of the prisoners thought he was the one and would be killed in a new volley. The mock execution was meant as a warning, and no one -- this time -- died. Upon the rebel victory, Raúl was placed in charge of Oriente Province. After little or no trial some 70 Batista followers were executed and their bodies buried in a mass grave. There were, however, kangaroo courts and executions across the island.


SOF has long been interested in the fate of Cuba, as the genesis of SOF can be tracked to RKB's initial involvement in revolutionary warfare, when he first supported, then opposed, Fidel Castro. In this photo Brown, third from left with M1928A1 Thompson, strikes a post-revolutionary pose on the rooftop of the Riviera hotel in Havana in February 1959, shortly after Castro had seized power in January. William Morgan, far left with Sterling, was former 82nd Airborne and the only gringo to become a commandante. Second from left is unidentified barbudo with M1 Thompson. At far right is Jack Nordeen, with Mk II Sten, a former soldier of fortune and adventurer who overcame polio and fought alongside Castro in the Sierra Maestras. Nordeen drifted off the radar screen, but Morgan was subsequently put up against the wall and shot. Photo: SOF files


And yet, when a top general, Arnaldo Ochoa, who had commanded Cuban forces in Angola, and other officers were tried on drug trafficking charges and sentenced to be executed, Raúl stated in a speech: "Deprived of sleep, I circled my desk and went to the bathroom behind my office to brush my teeth. Looking in the mir-ror I realized that tears were flowing down my cheeks."

A number of occurrences over the years provide clues to the multifaceted Raúl:

Scene 1: In March 1958 Raúl and a group of guerrillas leave the Sierra Maestra, where rebels led by Fidel Castro have been operating. Raúl opens a new and larger front in the Sierra del Cristal in easternmost Cuba. He builds roads for the locals, sets up administrative offices. He also establishes a rural intelligence service and the first rebel indoctrination schools.

Raúl demonstrates that he is a competent administrator, unlike his erratic and disorganized older brother, who eventually departs from the Sierra Maestra but leaves behind no trace of his presence.

Scene 2: Raúl, in firm control of the Sierra del Cristal, on 22 June 1958 orders the seizure of Americans living in his zone. The purpose is to prevent bombing of his area by Batista aircraft, as well as to protest the supposed providing of weapons by the United States to Batista -- which actually had ceased three months earlier. Raúl's guerrillas kidnap 20 employees of U.S.-owned sugar and mining companies, as well as 30 sailors and marines from the Guantánamo Naval Base (and one Cuban bus driver). The captives are well treated; they even celebrate the Fourth of July. Two U.S. consular officials from Santiago wend their way into the mountains and negotiate with Raúl. He releases the captives slowly, saying he is freeing the military so they can fight in Lebanon, where the United States has intervened militarily.

Scene 3: It is the height of the anti- American campaign in Cuba. The year is 1960 and the American embassy is holding what will be its last Fourth of July celebration. In through the front door strides Raúl Castro, followed by a single aide. He walks over to Ambassador Philip Bonsal and embraces him, much to the surprise of onlookers. They chat for a while in a most friendly manner.

Scene 4: It is early 1962 and the Soviet Union is fed up with the antics of its new ally/friend, Fidel Castro. Moscow quietly moves to have the old-line Cuban communists take control of the country. Castro is aware of this; he is despondent, drinking heavily in public.

At his command post at the other end of the island Raúl engages in a heated argument with a local communist labor leader, Juan Taquechel, He shoots Taquechel. Raúl flies to Havana, puts steel into Fidel's backbone. Castro goes on TV -- his favorite medium -- and excoriates the Cuban communists. He lashes at the "fearful sectarianism" of "old Marxist militancy."

One of the oldliners, Anibal Escalante, is sent packing to Prague and major alterations are made in the "socialist" ruling power structure.

Scene 5: With Soviet assistance, Raúl in the early ‘60s builds the largest military force in Latin America, with some half a million regular, reserve and militia troops. It is a modern, professional military in which promotion comes on the basis of merit and not family or party affiliation. Cuba fields armies for wars in Angola and Ethiopia and maintains military missions in much of Africa as well as in Grenada in the Caribbean and with the Sandinistas fighting dictator Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua. (Today, with foreign adventures ended, a U.S. invasion no longer feared and a national economy in need, the military have been down-sized, probably by as much as a half.)

Scene 6: The Soviet Union collapses in 1989; aid to Cuba is severely cut. The very existence of the Castro regime is threatened. Raúl urges his brother to permit free markets on the island and to take other economic measures, much as the Chinese communists had adopted in their country. The brothers argue bitterly, almost coming to blows. Fidel is adamant: no traces of capitalism will be permitted.

Scene 7: Shortages of food, fuel and other staples are dire; the Cuban populace is desperate. Years later an official related to this writer how he gave his bread ration to his daughter so she would have enough food at school. Public disturbances occur. In August 1994 there is a major riot in Havana. Raúl again goes to his brother, warns him that the Cuban army will not fire on Cubans. He points out that in similar situations in Eastern Europe the military sided with the people. Fidel reluctantly relents, allows the opening of markets in which farmers can sell their crops freely and keep the money. Other measures follow: craft markets, encouragement of foreign investments, permission for citizens to open restaurants in their homes, acceptance of U.S. dollars as currency. The Castro regime survives.

The army itself is already, or now becomes, heavily involved in the development of tourism. It also sells produce from its own farms on the open market. The military role in the economy is further strengthened as officers, upon retiring, are given managerial positions in industry and commerce. During the ‘60s and ‘70s the Cold War was in full swing. Cuba served as a Soviet military base. It meddled in the affairs of nations throughout Africa and Latin America. The United States felt justified in maintaining an economic embargo on trade and travel with the island. But today neither of these factors exists. There appears to be little sense in ineffectively trying to maintain the island in isolation. Few countries have had closer historical, cultural and economic ties with the United States than has Cuba, ever since we helped the Cubans win their independence more than a century ago.

Raúl says he is willing to talk with us. What do we have to lose? Not only might this lead to opening of the country, it could also stall the efforts of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to develop a Havana-Caracas axis as a base for an anti-American bloc of Latin American nations.

Raúl lacks his older brother's charisma but he makes up for this in his managerial and leadership abilities. He is not a publicity seeker trying to stay in the limelight. Having unchallenged authority and being backed by the military establishment he built, Raúl today nevertheless appears to be acting more as a company CEO than as a dictator. The new generation of leaders in Cuba have a say in the development of governmental policies.

Confident of his power and the stability of his regime, Raúl has even indicated he may allow voices of dissent to be heard on the island.

Official Washington is still in the ‘60s as far as the Miami Cubans are concerned. In that era the Cubans were refugees, bitterly opposed to Castro, who had forced them to flee their homeland. Today these oldtimers are a rapidly dwindling number. An entire new generation has grown up in Miami too, many of whom were born in the States and all educated in this country. They respect the feelings of their elders but their own interest in Cuba is more of curiosity and perhaps a desire to visit the island. Washington, however, continues to listen to the shrillest voices.

When Fidel Castro dies -- if he ever dies -- what happens? Nothing much. Raúl and the second generation of leaders -- economists and other technocrats -- have been running the country for some time. This writer visited Cuba a few years ago and interviewed more than half a dozen officials. Not one mentioned socialismo. And after Raúl? The top party/governmental structure is probably strong enough and sufficiently institutionalized to guarantee a continuation in power. In all likelihood it will be less authoritarian and more market-oriented. Look to China as the probable model. And whatever happens, the military will play a major role, as they have throughout most of Cuban history.