Dear Editor,
Paul Tennassee’s letter dated December 31, 2014 which was published in both the Stabroek News and the Kaieteur News and Peeping Tom’s article dated December 29m 2014 in KN, as they relate to the establishment of diplomatic relations between Guyana and Cuba are significantly flawed since they fail to discuss the context in which LFS Burnham, Prime Minister of a newly independent Guyana, operated between 1964 to 1972. Mr Tennessee in particular extrapolates conclusions from statements made by Mr Burnham without giving the context within which these statements were made.
The PPP at the time had actually had cadres militarily trained in Cuba and was involved in the training of its activists in the early 1960s.
At the regional level, it should be made very clear that the Cuban government at the time, advocated and supported the export of revolution in Latin America and that Dr Jagan had close links to the process. It was therefore not an indictment of Burnham when according to Mr Tennassee, Burnham said in referring to the support of the export of revolution in the region that “We have to bear in mind that we are dealing with a movement whose aims of organised insurrection affect many countries in the Hemisphere…” Burnham was pointing out a matter of fact. More importantly it was not in Guyana’s national interest to support the Cuban approach of the export of revolution.
Mr Tennassee further states that Burnham stated that “…The MIR represents in Venezuela the Castroite movement for organised violence and guerrilla warfare and has been actively engaged in attempting the overthrow of the Venezuelan government through guerilla activity and widespread acts of sabotage.” Should we be ashamed of that statement? Absolutely not. It should be stated that this is even more important when it is noted that Jagan supported that policy and had strong relations with the MIR in Venezuela.
Burnham correctly analyzed the situation in the hemisphere and recognized that Guyana’s interest did not lie in supporting the Castroite export of revolution. Here there is a confluence of the interests of Guyana and Venezuela and Burnham showed he had the intellectual capacity to understand and unravel the intricacies of the situation and promote Guyana’s interest.
The foregoing is very important if it is noted that the foremost concern of Guyana at that juncture was to deal with the Guyana-Venezuela territorial controversy. Burnham would have been foolhardy to support Cuba when its interest was in conflict with Guyana’s interest. The fact is, the situation in Latin America and the domestic political situation were not conducive to Guyana establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba. Burnham, therefore, rather than “being actively engaged in the campaign to isolate Cuba” was manifestly protecting Guyana’s interest.
In reference to Guyana establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba under Mr Burnham the then Prime Minister, Peeping Tom stated that “It is of greater significance that it took him more than six years to do so than it is of the fact that he helped break the diplomatic isolation of Cuba in the Caribbean.”
The foregoing statement misses the context in which Guyana was operating when Burnham came to power. Guyana’s foremost priority at the international level was to address the issue of the Guyana-Venezuela territorial controversy and to generally develop the diplomatic infrastructure that was required to protect Guyana’s territorial integrity vis-à-vis, the Venezuela territorial controversy and to a lesser extent Suriname maritime and territorial issues.
It is apposite to note that by 1970, as a result of the diplomatic work done; the Protocol of Port of Spain was signed placing the Guyana-Venezuela territorial controversy in cold storage and giving Guyana the breathing space to focus on other diplomatic issues.
It could not have been in Guyana’s interest for the issue of diplomatic relations with Cuba to be the focus of Guyana’s diplomatic efforts in the early stages of Guyana’s foreign policy. Lacking the military capability to deter Venezuela, Guyana’s task was to develop relations with the Caribbean, Brazil and the wider Latin America, and the developed Western world against Venezuela, a task which Burnham’s diplomacy achieved with distinction.
Had Burnham pursued diplomatic relations with Cuba before putting the required diplomatic infrastructure in place, to promote and protect Guyana’s interests would have been, to use Burnham’s words, “to court heroic death.” Burnham chose “to survive sensibly.” The extant conditions between 1964 and 1970 were not propitious to breaking Cuba’s diplomatic isolation.
Mr Tennassee and Peeping Tom’s suggestion that what Burnham did in relation to Cuba was mere opportunism is rubbish and cannot make it through the crucible of intellectual rigour. The truth is the context had changed. Would Mr Tennessee and Peeping Tom concede that if Burnham is opportunist, then Dr Jagan is, since he condemned and opposed the US throughout his early politics but when he saw the opportunity that the US would accept him as President in the post-Cold War era, he lobbied the US for support? Or is Dr Jagan a good tactician while Mr Burnham is an opportunist?
By the end of the 1960s the situation in Guyana and the region had changed significantly. At the national level, the government was no longer a coalition government with the UF, which Dr Jagan had described as a right-wing capitalist party.
At the regional level the situation had also changed. The MIR’s insurrectional activities were defeated in Venezuela. Cuba changed its policy of exporting revolution and began to focus on inter-state relations. To this end it is useful to note that the US State Department Special Report No 90 of December14, 1981 entitled ‘Cuba’s Renewed Support of Violence in Latin America’ stated that in 1968 after Cuba “failed to establish a continental revolution, Cuban foreign policy moved in closer conformity with that of the Soviet Union…Within the Hemisphere, Cuba generally conformed to the Soviet approach of fostering state-to-state relations with several Latin American countries.”
At the international level détente was the major policy focus; there was rapprochment between the US and the USSR; the US was talking to communist China and non-alignment was a relatively strong force in international relations.
What the foregoing suggests is that the national, regional and international situation had changed considerably by the early 1970s and was therefore conducive to the Burnham initiative to end the diplomatic isolation of Cuba. What is therefore significant is not the length of time Burnham took but his ability to correctly analyse the situation and pursue what turned out to be a decision that redounded to Guyana and the region’s benefit.
As it relates to Peeping Tom’s contention that “Burnham was too timid, too afraid of the Americans to have gone it alone,” it is clear that he does not understand the role of solidarity and support in foreign policy, and that it is generally better to have regional support for an initiative rather than going it alone. In any case, Burnham made it clear to Caricom states that his preference was to have a collective decision in relation to Cuba, but if necessary he was prepared to do so alone.
I do believe that Dr Jagan was more known in the international communist movement than Mr Burnham. However, the contention that Dr Jagan was more respected in the socialist world is questionable. The evidence suggests that Castro respected Burnham while Jagan was sure to do whatever was dictated to him by the communist world. That (dis)honour I would never want Burnham to get.
As it relates to the contention that Mr Burnham wanted to neutralise Dr Jagan, I agree. It was necessary in the politics of the day for Burnham to neutralise Jagan. It was politics. Do not write as if it was Sunday school and Jagan was offering an olive branch to Burnham. He was against Burnham.
Yours faithfully,
Aubrey C Norton
