Our Woman in Havana

by Vicki Huddleston

  A few weeks into my tenure I thought I was making progress when we received an invitation to attend the “old-timers” baseball game between the Cuban and Venezuelan teams. Generally the Cubans did not include the Interests Section when they extended invitations to the diplomatic corps, nor did the State Department invite Cuban diplomats to their functions. Sometimes I was pleased not to be included because I was spared from attending Fidel’s interminable speeches on July 26, the anniversary of his attack on Moncada Barracks. But I was pleased to have received this unexpected invitation. I hoped—definitely more optimistically than realistically—that perhaps this was a small gesture reciprocating my friendly round of introductory calls on Cuban officials.

  Castro was coaching the Cuban old-timers, while Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez was pitching for his national team. We entered the stadium just as iron bars were descending across the entry, blocking thousands still waiting to get in. Every Cuban loves baseball; the players are excellent, and often pursued by US major league teams, which pay them salaries that are unimaginable in Cuba. Those who defect either hire a human smuggler, attempt to cross the Florida Straits in a small craft with friends or family, or quietly defect when their team is playing in another country.

  With our invitation in hand we approached the section reserved for diplomats. A cross-looking official examined it, then asked what country we represented.

  “Estados Unidos” (the United States), I told him.

  Without any hesitation, he exclaimed, “No hay espacio.”

  “If there is no space here, then where should we go?” I asked. He simply shrugged and walked away. Maneuvering among the excited crowd, we were about to sit on a bench in the right-field section when a rather haughty man announced “No, señores, this is not the place for you.” I was beginning to wonder if there was any place for us when we spotted the international media staked out on top of the Venezuelan dugout. We squeezed in, and they didn’t mind sharing space with some cast-off diplomats.

  From the roof of the dugout, we had a good view of Chávez, whose paunchy frame didn’t prevent him from getting the ball over the plate with enough zip to strike out Castro’s old-timers. We could see Fidel sitting in the Cuban dugout, chatting happily, possibly remembering the days before the revolution, when he had a fastball good enough to get him a tryout with the old Washington Senators. By the fifth inning, Fidel’s old-timers trailed the Venezuelans, until some even older old-timers, with long gray beards, began getting hits that put players on base. It turned out that these recent additions were younger players from Cuba’s national team who had donned false beards. Castro wasn’t going to lose to his protégé, Chávez, even if the game was just for fun.

  We might have escaped notice had I not run into Chávez’s wife, Nancy Colmenares, an attractive peroxide blonde, who was approaching the dugout as I was leaving. We literally ended up toe-to-toe. I excused myself, beyond which there seemed to be no appropriate comment. But the incident did not escape the eyes of the ever-sensitive Cubans. The following day, the official newspaper, Granma, reported that the Cuban old-timers had won—no surprise there. Inside, however, was another article that lamented the poor security practices of the Venezuelans. This was directed at my little encounter with Colmenares. The Cubans did not like the idea that their number one enemy had somehow managed to gain entry to this friendly game. And rather than behaving, I had the nerve to call attention to myself by supposedly sidling up to and greeting the wife of their honored guest.

  I told myself that this was a minor incident; surely, we would make up. Yet the auguries were not good—my first several weeks in Havana seemed to indicate that Castro was not reciprocating Clinton’s attempts to improve relations. Certainly I wasn’t going to become a trusted go-between.

  CHAPTER 4

  A PROVOCATION

  MUCH TO MY DISMAY, I REALIZED THE CUBANS WERE CONVINCED that I had been sent to Havana to lead the Cuban human rights activists—or dissidents, as I referred to them. I had gotten to know some of the older dissidents when I had been director of Cuban affairs at the State Department. But what poisoned my relations with the Cuban hierarchy was a meeting that Charles Shapiro, the newly appointed officer responsible for Cuba policy in Washington, DC, had with dissidents at the American residence prior to my arrival. The Cubans had either monitored the meeting with listening devices or had received reports from a dissident who was in their service. In any case, the meeting between Charles and the dissidents convinced the Cubans that I would encourage and possibly help them to disrupt the upcoming Ibero-American Summit.

  Fidel Castro was delighted that for the first time Cuba had been given the honor of hosting the summit, and he wanted everything to go smoothly. Not only would his peers be present, but also Spain’s King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofía. This would be the first time that a Spanish king had set foot in Cuba; it was a momentous occasion, and Castro wasn’t going to let the dissidents or I spoil it. It was unfortunate that he didn’t know that I had absolutely no intention of advising the dissidents or helping them protest the summit. It would have avoided a lot of ill will.

  The week before the Ibero-American Summit, which would be held on November 16, 1999, I was focused on the visit of Illinois governor George Ryan. I was concerned that Ryan, in an effort to please his hosts, might avoid the Interests Section. In most countries, American diplomats greet high-level American visitors at the airport and accompany them to the embassy, where they are briefed about local conditions. This was not always the case in Cuba where, to please their hosts, American officials sometimes avoided meeting with us. This meant that they were only exposed to Castro’s version of Cuba; it also made us diplomats feel as if we were being scorned. Intent on keeping members of the US Congress from meeting with us, state security would switch air terminals at the last minute, so we would be unable to locate our visitors.

  I didn’t like being treated as a pariah. Since Governor Ryan’s visit was important, I called him and we agreed that I would host meetings for him with foreign ambassadors and Cuban dissidents. He would come alone, leaving behind his delegation and his Cuban “minder.” (All VIPs are assigned a minder whose job is to take care of their every need.) Ryan’s minder would serve as a guide, friend, and confidant, later reporting back to the Ministry of the Interior. As planned, on the second day of Ryan’s visit, a black Mercedes provided by his Cuban hosts dropped him off at my residence in time for breakfast with the British, French, Italian, Spanish, and Turkish ambassadors. I immediately liked him. He fit my vision of a typical Chicago politician: big, with a booming voice, gregarious and charismatic.

  I welcomed him to the lovely mansion built as the residence for our ambassadors and now for the chiefs of our Interests Section. I told him that the residence had been constructed in 1942 with the idea that President Franklin Roosevelt would visit. But World War II had intervened, and Roosevelt missed staying in the Rose Room that looked out over the formal gardens and the magnificent bronze eagle that had once adorned the two columns of the monument to the sailors who went down with the USS Maine, its wings outspread. This sculpted eagle had taken flight many years ago in one of the frequent hurricanes that hit Havana. Prominent Cuban business leaders had repaired it and given it to the American ambassador as a token of Cuban and American friendship. A new eagle was placed atop the seafront monument, but it didn’t nest there for long; Fidel’s rebels tore it down shortly after the revolution.

  Located behind our great bronze eagle were lovely mansions that once belonged to Havana’s elite. Gabriel García Márquez, the author who figured as Castro’s liaison with Clinton, lived nearby in a house given to him by Fidel. But no one lived in three large houses that faced 146th Street; they had other uses. One was used as a set for a local soap opera broadcast on Cuban television. The other two were strategically located with video and listening devices pointed at my residence; the windows in the back of these houses looked directly into the garden, where the eagle stood watch. />
  I introduced Ryan to the ambassadors, who would not have mentioned the listening devices pointed at our breakfast party from the neighboring houses if they had noticed them. It was simply impossible to evade Cuban surveillance. None of them had any illusions, as they knew that every word they said would be recorded and possibly videotaped. The British ambassador relished telling a story about how a basket of potatoes magically appeared at his door. He was hosting a high-ranking British official and his cook wanted potatoes for this special dinner. But none were to be had on the local market. Frustrated, the ambassador decided to send a message to his Cuban watchers. He walked into his garden and announced that he needed potatoes. His watchers—or their listening devices—heard him and the next morning a basket of spuds was on his doorstep.

  As a VIP visitor Ryan could expect that his limousine, hotel room, and wherever he dined would also hold the omnipresent listening devices. Diplomats and businessmen knew that if they misbehaved, Cuban security would know. An illicit affair could be used by security to ensure that the diplomat reported favorably on Cuba or that a businessman arranged a favorable contract.

  Ryan was delighted to be in the company of ambassadors and impressed that they were willing to talk frankly with him. Over a typical American breakfast, they gave him their candid views on US policy (unfavorable) and on the Castro government (also unfavorable). As the discussion ended, Ryan summarized his understanding by commenting to the group, “You might say the trouble with Cuba is Castro.” We laughed, ruefully, aware that it was true but that no one would dare say so publicly.

  Next I introduced Ryan to Cuba’s leading human rights activists. They were waiting for him in the spacious dining room on the ground floor, where two palm trees in large planters framed the curved French doors that looked out on the tennis court and swimming pool. This room, too, was under audio surveillance—both human and nonhuman. Our security officer warned me that he did not bother to look for the video and audio devices because if he found them, they would soon be replaced. The dissidents knew this. They also knew that my Cuban staff would report on who attended; they had no choice if they wished to keep their jobs. I waited until the coffee and cakes had been served and the Cuban staff left the room before beginning the discussion.

  Each dissident told his story. Some had spent years in prison, suffering physical abuse at the hands of the Cuban government or its sympathizers. Gustavo Arcos Bergnes, one of Cuba’s first and most eminent dissidents, told the governor that in the early years he had been one of Castro’s militants who had attacked the Moncada Barracks. But after the revolution succeeded, he and Fidel had had a falling-out. Arcos was imprisoned, served his term, and then became a prominent dissident. Elizardo Sánchez, a former professor, explained to Governor Ryan that he kept in contact with several hundred political prisoners and dissidents. Two independent journalists, who had recently formed their own group of dissidents, told him that if they were well known abroad, they would be less likely to be jailed. Cuban security was more hesitant to scorn, abuse, or jail a well-known dissident, whose story would be reported by the international media. Sánchez spoke for everyone present when he told Ryan that even though his life was difficult, he would remain and fight for his beliefs. He lamented that the entire island was like a company that belonged to Castro, though he didn’t dare utter Fidel’s name. Instead, he made a motion with his hand to show he was stroking an imaginary beard. Ryan was shocked. He seemed touched, and thanked the group profusely.

  Ryan was upset. He strode out the front door, across the driveway, and out the entrance gate to where a gaggle of reporters was waiting. There along the narrow partially paved road across from one of Castro’s principal residences he held an impromptu press conference.

  Ryan did not mention what he had told the journalist, so when I reached my office the next morning, my staff was waiting to show me an article in the Diario de las Americas, Miami’s oldest Spanish-language newspaper. It proclaimed that Ryan had concluded, “The trouble with Cuba is Castro!” No one ever criticized Castro, and certainly not an important guest like Ryan. Fidel was furious, and canceled Ryan’s invitation to dine with him. Ryan and his delegation were devastated; the late-night dinner with Castro was to have been the high point of their visit.

  Neither Ryan nor his delegation wanted to give up their dinner with Fidel. What would they tell friends and family when they returned home? The major event for every VIP visitor was a meeting with the legendary Castro. The next day the Diario published a correction: Ryan hadn’t said uttered the sentence of his own volition but had simply repeated what the dissidents he met at the residence had told him.

  This was an unforgivable disservice to the dissidents. I was appalled, and feared that they would be rounded up and jailed for criticizing Castro to such a special visitor. Those had been Ryan’s words, not the dissidents’; none of them had criticized Castro or even spoken his name. I didn’t know whether Ryan, a member of his delegation, or even a Cuban official had changed the story. In the hope that Ryan would exonerate the dissidents, I sought him out at his hotel, the Golden Tulip.

  When I arrived, Cuban security was waiting for me. Usually the door to the room where Cubans monitor their guests’ conversations is tightly shut. But the room next to Ryan’s suite was open to make sure that I could see that security officials were going to listen to our every word. Given the omnipresent listeners, I wasn’t about to talk to the governor in his room. As we headed out, Ryan’s minder, who accompanied him to his meetings, caught up with us as we entered the elevator. Thinking we were headed outside the hotel, he got out on the main floor. I pushed the up button, giving us just enough time to find a strategic location on the terrace where we could see the minder but he could not overhear us.

  I told Ryan that what he already knew, that he—not the dissidents—had said “the trouble with Cuba is Castro.” But he wasn’t about to change his story. The new version—possibly made up by the Cubans themselves—blaming the dissidents had mollified Castro, who had reissued his dinner invitation. The governor’s visit and Fidel’s prestige had been rescued by the timely, if false, retraction. I consoled myself with the thought that Castro surely knew that it was Ryan who had unthinkingly blurted out the truth. It was all part of the media show. Ryan had messed up his role, but his visit was now back on track.

  I drove home thinking that there would be no more difficulties with Ryan’s visit. But I was wrong. I was awakened at about two o’clock the next morning. It was one of Castro’s aides, calling to tell me that Governor Ryan would like to have visas issued for a child who had suffered a serious head injury when he fell from a second-story window. During dinner at the Palacio de la Revolución Castro had agreed to allow the boy and his parents to accompany the governor to Chicago for urgent medical care. Neither Ryan nor his aides had told my staff or me about the injured child or their plan to bring him to Chicago. Annoyed, I replied that the parents should apply for a visa at the consular section in the morning.

  By late morning neither the Cuban government nor the child’s parents had applied for visas. Fearing that the family might be denied entry or be forced to remain at the Chicago airport, US consul general Patty Murphy suggested that we find them and issue the visas. The couple was sitting forlornly on a bench at the airport in Havana with their child in their arms. We were both saddened, but Patty was relieved that now they wouldn’t encounter difficulties with US Customs. I was furious. Ryan had simply ignored the rules, apparently assuming that US immigration authorities wouldn’t give him any difficulty, even though he intended to bring with him three undocumented Cubans.

  I remained at the airport, determined to tell Ryan that he had acted unwisely. I waited impatiently until a black limousine pulled up in front of the VIP waiting rooms. I marched over to the VIP room and was about to knock on the door when one of the security guards stopped me. “No es permitido,” he said. I ignored his “It’s not permitted” and banged on the door, which swung open a
way from me and into the room. Unbalanced, I fell forward into the arms of Ricardo Alarcón, the man I had hoped would be my advocate with the Cuban government. He was speechless. Foreign Minister Felipe Pérez Roque was white-faced with anger. Neither realized that I had tried to knock. Both assumed that I egregiously barged into a meeting of senior Cuban officials. There was a long silence. I disengaged myself, apologized, and made a hasty exit. Alarcón, who later got his voice back, condemned my falta de respeto; the next edition of Granma also rebuked me for my “lack of respect.”

  I got in my car and headed back to the US Interests Section. I had been in Cuba for all of two months and everything seemed to be falling apart. Cuba’s highest officials thought that I was in the country to encourage the dissidents to wreck the Ibero-American Summit. If that wasn’t bad enough, now they would blame me for wrecking Governor Ryan’s visit. Worse of all, they would in the future refuse to deal with me because I had been—so they believed—very rude.

  That evening I learned that the situation was even more dreadful than I had imagined. Apparently I had supposedly insulted Castro as well. For well over two hours, Castro warned his radio and TV audience to beware of the dangerous woman in their midst. Staring at my television, I could hardly believe that Fidel was accusing me, an American diplomat, of being a threat to the tightly controlled Cuban state. Sure, I had made a mistake, but most of the fault was on the Cuban side; they had used Ryan shamelessly. And now they were blowing the incident at the airport out of all proportion. It was unfair and unprecedented. And if they thought I was going to be intimidated, they would soon find out they were wrong.