It would not be entirely surprising that a Pope whose origins are in Argentina, though he is indeed of Spanish parentage, would have had a particular interest in an issue that has fascinated Latin Americans for most of his own lifetime, this being the political evolution of a Cuba which veered from the autocracy of Batista to a Soviet-style authoritarianism over the period from 1958 to the present.
But that Pope, Francis, has nonetheless surprised the international community with the initiative that he took that has led to a determined push towards a resumption of conventional state-to-state relations between the United States and Cuba, which has now decisively begun; an initiative too, for which he has obviously had a certain legitimacy that has evaded others who would have long wished to see the process consolidated with the end of the Cold War.
Pope Francis would obviously have had the advantage of a fulsome understanding not only of Latin American politics, or of the politics of the Western hemisphere as a whole, but as has now been frequently pointed out, he was himself a citizen of a country which has experienced the autocracy of Juan Peron as well as the last period of dictatorship of the Argentinian military between 1976 and 1983. And in addition, few observers have omitted pointing out a certain kind of relationship that, in a sense, psychologically linked Cuba and Argentina after Fidel Castro came to power, between himself and his Cuban comrades and Che Guevara, a native of Argentina.
But in addition to these factors, and the ending of the Cold War, the observation cannot be omitted that the presence of Barack Obama as President of the United States, has also been the other critical factor in the scenario currently evolving.
The initiative taken by the President in, as it were, responding to the initiatives initially emanating from Rome needs a certain recognition, to the extent that, as the campaign for the next presidential election evolves in the United States, we are reminded, of the extent to which possibilities of what can be called Cold War options still prevail in that country.
That reminder comes not so much from American responses to the political evolution of the ruling group in Moscow, as to a residual resistance to the United States coming to terms with issues in US relations with other countries that are characterized as having non-democratic regimes, often highly ideological in nature.
Specifically, it is useful to take note of the fact that as President Obama has responded to Pope Francis’ initiative on Cuba. And bearing in mind that the Pope has also sought to relate to the continuing dispute between Colombia and Venezuela in which Cuba has had a longstanding interest, there remains a certain resistance, magnified by the fact that presidential election fever has begun to rage, to initiatives by Obama seeking to come to terms with issues of major concern to the United States.
Specifically, we note resistance to a parallel Obama initiative to that on Cuba, this being the President’s determination to negotiate the issue of the establishment of a nuclear weapons construction capability in Iran. The insistence by, in particular, Republican forces in the American Congress, strongly pushed by the Government of Israel, has been strong, and the initiative almost torpedoed.
What is probably likely, however, is that in some measure, a reasonable number of American political decision-makers have, in spite of strong pressure and virtual political interference in the American political process by the Government of Israel, been constrained by President Obama to recognise and accept the larger national interest in the matter.
And what is instructive in respect of both issues is the increasing recognition, not simply by the American government itself but by a certain public opinion in the United States and elsewhere, that longstanding issues can no longer be held hostage to Cold War sentiments, not only as the structure of global relations has begun to change, with a determining evolution of decisions by countries like China, but also in consequence of the fact that the determination of some to keep pushing issues and difficulties among the powers into a Cold War box, is no longer an automatic guarantee of electioneering success.
The relative isolation of Cuba from its Soviet, now Russian, supporters has been well recognized by Obama, as President Putin himself struggles to reorganize the post-Soviet economy of his country, in a context in which new economic relationships have to be established as the old Soviet dominance of its political alliances has disappeared.
It seems obvious that Pope Francis, with his familiarity with the issues now prevailing in the non-Western world, has induced the Western world itself to think more broadly than the political and ideological parameters which that world or Nato had set for themselves.
And from our geographical perspective, it is probably not wishful thinking to contemplate that as he has sought to help carve the way towards a further normalization of Cuban relations in this hemisphere, that cognizant of other issues like that of the border relations between Venezuela and Colombia, he will have been urging a peaceful resolution of difficulties, such as he has helped to pursue in relation to Cuba, a strong and persistent ally of Venezuela itself.
