Today, the measures adopted include the inspection of
Iran’s merchant vessels and severe economic sanctions aimed at
suffocating its economy.
I have been following very closely the grave
dangers that may result from that situation, because if a war breaks out
in that region, it could very quickly go nuclear, and this will have
lethal consequences for the rest of the planet.
In referring to such danger I was not looking for
publicity or sensationalism. I just wanted to warn the world public
opinion hoping that, being advised of such grave danger it could
contribute to avoid it.
At least we have managed to draw attention to a problem that was hardly mentioned by the big world media.
This has made me use part of the time scheduled
for the launching of this book, on which we worked diligently. I did not
want this to coincide with the dates of September 7 and 9. September 7
marks the end of the 90 days term established by the Security Council to
know whether Iran complied or not with the requirement of authorizing
the inspection of its merchant vessels. September 9 marks the expiration
of the three months term fixed by the Resolution adopted on June 9.
Quite possibly the establishment of this last term was what the Security
Council intended to do originally.
So far we have only had the weird statement made
by the Director General of the IAEA (International Atomic Energy
Agency), the Japanese Yukiya Amano, a man who serves the interests of
the Yankees. He added all the fuel to the flames and then, like Pontius
Pilate, he washed his hands of the issue.
A spokesperson from the Foreign Ministry of Iran
commented his statements with a well earned contempt. According to a
news report published by EFE, Amano’s assertion that “‘our friends
should not worry, because we don’t believe our region is in the position
to engage in new military adventures’ and that ‘Iran was fully prepared
to respond to any military invasion’ was an obvious reference to the
Cuban leader Fidel Castro, ‘who warned about a possible Israeli nuclear
attack against Iran with the support of the United States’”.
News on this topic are pouring and get mixed with others of remarkable repercussion.
The journalist Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic
magazine, already known by our people, has been publishing some excerpts
of the long interview he made me. He has been discussing some
interesting aspects of it before he finally writes a future and long
article.
“There were many odd things about my recent Havana
stopover, [...]“, he wrote, but one of the most unusual was Fidel
Castro’s level of self-reflection [...] but it seemed truly striking
that Castro was willing to admit that he misplayed his hand at a crucial
moment in the Cuban Missile Crisis [...] that he regrets asking
Khrushchev to nuke the U.S.” It is true that he addressed the topic and
he asked me that question. Literally, as he wrote in the first part of
his report, his words were the following: “I asked him: At a certain
point it seemed logical for you to recommend that the Soviets bomb the
U.S. Does what you recommended still seem logical now?” He answered:
“After I’ve seen what I’ve seen, and knowing what I know now, it wasn’t
worth it all.”
I had thoroughly explained to him -and there is
written evidence of that- the content of that message: “…if the United
States invades Cuba, a country with Russian nuclear weapons, under such
circumstances Russia should not allow to be dealt the first strike, as
the one dealt against the USSR on June 22, 1941, when the German army
and all European forces attacked the USSR.”
As can be observed from that brief reference to
the issue, from the second part of his report to the audience on that
news, readers could not realize that “if the United States invaded Cuba,
a country with Russian nuclear weapons”, under such circumstances, my
recommendation was to prevent the enemy from launching the first strike;
nor the profound irony embedded in my response - “…and knowing what I
know now…”, which was an obvious reference to the betrayal by one
Russian President who saturated himself with some ethylic substance and
revealed to the United States the most important military secrets of
that country.
Further on Goldberg wrote about another moment of
our conversation: “I asked him if he believed the Cuban model was still
something worth exporting.” Obviously, that question implicitly
suggested the theory that Cuba exported the Revolution. So I responded:
“The Cuban model doesn’t even work for us anymore”. I said this to him
without any bitterness or concern. And now I laugh at the way he
literally interpreted what I said and how, according to him, he
consulted it with Julia Sweig, a CFR analyst who accompanied him and
worked out the theory he described. But the truth is that the meaning of
my response was exactly the opposite of the interpretation made by both
American journalists of the Cuban model.
My idea, as everybody knows, is that the
capitalist system does not work anymore either for the United States or
the world, which jumps from one crisis into the next, and these are ever
more serious, global and frequent and there is no way the world could
escape from them. How could such a system work for a socialist country
like Cuba?
Many Arab friends worried when they knew I had met
with Goldberg, and sent some messages describing him as “the staunchest
advocate of Zionism.”
From all of these we can infer the big confusion
that exists in the world. Therefore I hope that what I am telling you
about my thoughts could be useful.
The ideas I expressed are contained in 333
Reflections -see what a coincidence. The last 26 refer exclusively to
the problems affecting the environment and the imminent danger of a
nuclear war.
And now I should very briefly add something.
I have always condemned the Holocaust. I my
Reflections entitled “Obama’s Speech in Cairo”, “A Swipe Waiting to
Happen”, and “The Opinion of an Expert” I expressed this very clearly.
I have never been an enemy of the Jewish people,
which I admire for having resisted dispersion and persecution during two
thousand years. Many of the most brilliant talents, such as Karl Marx
and Albert Einstein, were Jews, because that was a nation where the most
intelligent managed to survive by virtue of a natural law. In our
country and in the whole world they were persecuted and slandered. But
this is just pat of the ideas I defend.
They were not the only one who were persecuted and
slandered for their beliefs. Muslims were attacked and persecuted for
their beliefs by the European Christians for much more than 12
centuries, just as the first Christians were in ancient Rome before
Christianity became an official religion of that empire. History should
be accepted and remembered just the way it happened, with all its tragic
realities and its fierce wars. I have spoken about that and that is why
I have all the more reason to explain the dangers jeopardizing
humankind today, when wars have become the biggest suicide risk for our
fragile species.
If we add to this a war against Iran, even if it
were of a conventional nature, the United States would rather turn off
the light and say goodbye. How could the US put up with a war against
1.5 million Muslims?
For any true revolutionary, defending peace does
not mean to renounce to the principles of justice, without which human
life and society would be meaningless.
I still believe that Goldberg is an excellent
journalist who is able to set out, in an enjoyable way and masterly way,
his views, which promotes debate. He does not invent phrases; he
transfers them and interprets them.
I will not refer to the content of many others
aspects of our conversation. I will respect the secrecy of the issues we
discussed and I eagerly await his future long article.
The current news that have started to pour from
all sources make me to complement his presentation with these words
whose essence is contained in the book “La contraofensiva estratégica”
(The Strategic Counteroffensive), which I have just presented.
I believe that all peoples have the right to peace
and enjoy all the goods and natural resources of the planet. What is
currently going on with peoples in many countries of Africa, where there
are millions of emaciated children, women and men out of lack of food,
water and medicines is a shame. We feel astonished by the images we see
from the Middle East, where Palestinians are deprived from their lands,
their homes are demolished by gigantic equipment, and men, women and
children are bombed with white phosphorus and other extermination means;
the Dantesque scenes of families exterminated by the bombs dropped over
Afghan and Pakistani towns by drones; the Iraqis who are dying after
years of war; and the more than one million lives lost in that conflict
imposed by a US President.
The last we could expect to see were the news
about the expulsion of the French gypsies, who are victims of a new sort
of racial Holocaust. The strong protest by the French is only logical.
At the same time, the millionaires restrict French citizens’ rights to
retirement while reducing the possibilities to get a job.
From the US we have heard the news of a pastor in
Florida that intends to burn the Holy Book of the Quran in its own
church. Even the Yankee and military chiefs engaged in punitive war
missions were disturbed by the news which they believed would put their
soldiers in jeopardy.
Walter Martínez, the prestigious journalist who
conducts the Venezuelan TV program Dossier, was amazed at such madness.
Yesterday, Thursday 9th in the evening, some news
asserted that the pastor had relinquished his idea. It might be
necessary to know what the FBI agents who visited him told him to
“persuade him”. That was a colossal media show, a chaos. Those are
things proper of an empire that is sinking.
I thank all of you for your attention.
September 10, 2010.
