Donald Trump is escalating the US war on Cuba. Canada is assisting.
After imposing a devastating oil blockade four months ago, the US recently announced it was indicting Raul Castro on murder charges for the 94-year old’s purported role in shooting down an airplane three decades ago. ‘Apprehending’ Castro for trial in the US may be a pretext Washington employs to justify an invasion. In January the US “arrested” Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro during an invasion.
The US recently dispatched an aircraft carrier strike group to the Caribbean. Washington did the same before kidnapping Venezuela’s president four months ago.
In recent days Washington has sought to portray the small island nation, which was heavily dominated by the US before its 1959 revolution, as a threat to the US. On Thursday Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, “Cuba not only has weapons they’ve acquired from Russia and China, but they also host Russian and Chinese intelligence presence in their country. So Cuba has always posed a national security threat to the US. They’re a leading state sponsor of terror.”
How is Canada assisting Washington’s war drive?
Dovetailing with Trump’s bid to squeeze the island, Ottawa introduced a travel advisory that led to flights being cancelled and dissuaded travel to the tourist-dependent economy. The loss of Canadian tourists has cost Cuba tens of millions, probably a hundred million dollars.
Ottawa has refused to defend Canadian corporate interests ensnared by the ‘Donroe Doctrine’. When the US introduced the Helms Burton act in 1996 to target firms doing business in Cuba, Ottawa responded with legislation to protect Canadians from the application of US law. The Foreign Extraterritorial Measures Act was introduced “to help protect Canadians and Canadian businesses from extraterritorial application of foreign law.”
At the time executives of Canadian miner Sherritt International, which has several partnerships with the Cuban government, were the first people barred from the US under the Helms-Burton Act. But Ottawa defended the company. Recently, Sherritt has been devastated by new US sanctions without any comment or action from the federal government. In what may be a brazen Trumpian shakedown of a Canadian corporation, Sherritt recently signed an agreement with a firm controlled by a close Trump associate in a last ditch bid to stave off bankruptcy.
Ottawa has sanctioned vessels considered defying Trump’s patently illegal oil embargo of Cuba. As the former head of the Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade Richard Sanders reported, Ottawa has sanctioned several vessels, including the only one to defy the embargo, that have sought to bring oil to Cuba.
On the military front Canadian forces integrated with US units may participate in an invasion. They are already likely assisting the US in gathering intelligence on the island. Through Operation CARIBBE, “Canada’s contribution to US-led enhanced counter-narcotics operations in the Caribbean”, they may support US aggression.
Hundreds of Canadian soldiers through NORAD monitor the Caribbean. They almost certainly assist US spying on Cuba (Canadian NORAD personnel were put on high alert when the US illegally blockaded Cuba in October 1962 even though Prime Minister Diefenbaker hesitated in supporting US actions during the Cuban Missile Crisis.)
As has been documented by multiple sources, including the 2015 International Journal article “Our men in Havana: Canadian foreign intelligence operations in Castro’s Cuba”, Canada has spied for the US since the Cuban revolution. In fact, Washington’s request for Canadian spying assistance is part of the reason Ottawa never severed diplomatic relations with Havana.
The Communications Security Establishment (CSE), Canada’s NSA, listened to Cuban leaders’ secret conversations from an interception post in the Canadian embassy in Havana. Canadian diplomats were among the first to alert the US to incoming Soviet arms and troops before the Cuban Missile Crisis. A senior Canadian official, close to Washington, explained Inside Canadian intelligence: exposing the new realities of espionage and international terrorism “admitted that the U.S. made ‘far greater use’ of our intelligence during the Cuban Missile Crisis than has been revealed.” Pentagon and State Department sources cite the U.K. and Canada as the only countries that “supply any real military information on Cuba” with Canada providing “the best” military intelligence.
After the missile crisis, Prime Minister Lester Pearson reached a secret accord with President John F. Kennedy to allow Canadian diplomats to act as CIA spies. According to a summary, “Under the cover of political officers, Canadian diplomat-spies mounted an intensive program to identify and photograph Soviet military activities. They conducted ‘drive-by’ scouting missions across the Cuban countryside to locate Soviet bases and missile sites. Reports were sent from Havana to Ottawa via diplomatic pouch, then securely forwarded to the Canadian embassy in Washington and physically handed over to the US State Department.”
In all likelihood, Canada still assists the US in intelligence gathering.
A poll last month found that most Canadians want Ottawa to demand an end to the US’ energy blockade, even if it impacts relations with the Trump administration. But Ottawa should go beyond speaking out against the criminal oil blockade and the possibility of a US invasion. Canada should extricate itself from any direct assistance to the US aggression.
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