In the US there were some who regarded the change of policy as a sell-out of loyal allies, as with Thieu in Vietnam. For others, it was a wise decision, leading to an enlightened solution such as that in Rhodesia-Zimbabwe. Optimism spread because the Nicaraguan Government, under the pressure of a great economic crisis and disheartened by the lack of new Cuban support, was swinging back to the centre. The new Venezuelan President made an early state visit to Nicaragua in the month of May, only three weeks after his inauguration. He was welcomed by an enthusiastic populace, who had not forgotten the Venezuelan contribution to the overthrow of Somoza in 1979 and the hopes then surging for a better and more democratic future. The message was not lost on the left-wing Sandinista leaders who had been losing support among the masses. They wanted to avoid regional isolation.
Cuba’s premier made a last-ditch effort to avert the tide of Mexican-Venezuelan-sponsored political reforms. He travelled to Nicaragua at the same time as delegates started gathering in Mexico City to draw up a plan for democracy in El Salvador. But his effort to create a ‘rejection front’ proved unsuccessful, even in Nicaragua. The US discreetly let it be known to the more moderate of the Sandinistas that it would consider re-establishing diplomatic relations and the flow of aid if the Sandinistas freed political prisoners, sanctioned civil liberties and let opposition newspapers be printed again.
By the beginning of 1985, therefore, Cuba had to reconsider its position, and started to do so fairly fast.
When the Third World War started in the summer of 1985, El Salvador had just become insecurely democratic. Guatemala and Honduras were still (but now less securely) military dictatorships. The President of Mexico had, sadly, been assassinated in January but everybody assumed that Mexico and Venezuela would soon arrange a ‘political solution’ in these two countries too. In Nicaragua the moderates now had a more powerful voice in the civilian leadership (which was drawing aid from the US and Venezuela, and had also applied to the International Monetary Fund), but the military and security forces in Nicaragua were still very left wing, because they had been systematically penetrated by Cuba. The IMF’s investigators considered Nicaragua still too much run by soldiers who thought they were socialists, which in their view was economically not a good combination.
Cuba was rethinking its posture rather desperately when the Soviet tanks rolled into Western Europe. The orders from Moscow were explicit: ‘Proceed against the United States into full-scale war.’ The Cubans sensibly half-ratted, and the Americans foolishly overreacted to what little the Cubans did.
After a desperate high-level meeting in Havana through most of 4 August 1985, the Cubans sent a long coded telex back to Moscow. The first thirty pages consisted of obsequious expressions of support for the fundamental revolutionary justice of the Soviet cause. The decoder in Moscow working on the complicated Atropos decoding system could not conceal his impatience. Eventually he got to the sentences the Kremlin was waiting for, and they did not say what the Kremlin wanted. The vital parts of the Cuban message to Moscow on 5 August ran: ‘The risks before socialist Cuba are enormous, considering the possibility of US nuclear retaliation. Our options are in fact very few. Cuba does not have the military capacity to mount an invasion of a major Latin American country. To attack the US by air is too risky. Sea actions are out of the question; the Cuban navy has a capacity only for a limited degree of coastal vigilance and self-defence. American naval predominance in this region is total. Attacks against specific objectives in the Caribbean (for instance, Puerto Rico) have been most seriously considered. It is the unanimous view here that they would be ineffective, indeed actually harmful for the Soviet cause at this stage of the conflict.
‘We have nevertheless determined on the most courageous action in support of our socialist cause. This action will take three forms. First, we will accelerate our aircraft lifts of ammunition, supplies and some soldiers to selected spots on the mainland of Central America already under socialist or guerrilla control. Secondly, we will alert air squadrons and missiles on our airfields, and be ready to attack American shipping and US convoys bound for Europe. We are sure that you recognize, however, that this assault must be launched at the appropriate moment, when we can strike most violently and effectively. If we strike prematurely, before the really vital targets are at sea, we may be destroyed by American nuclear missiles; and our great usefulness to the common cause — as the independent socialist country nearest to the heartland of capitalism — could be wiped out in five minutes. Thirdly, as our most immediate contribution, all Cuba has been mobilized for war. Our armed forces are concentrating against the Americans’ Guantanamo naval base. An assault will be launched upon this at the moment when our attack on American shipping begins.’
This Atropos coded message was read, after decoding, by two very different generals, one in Moscow and one in Miami.
Army General I. P. Seriy of the Second Main Directorate (military intelligence) of the Army General Staff (the GRU) accurately minuted for the Soviet High Command: ‘Cuba is clearly deserting us as disgracefully as Mussolini deserted Hitler in 1939. The Cubans will join the war only when they think we have won it. After Soviet victory we should treat their renegade leader far less kindly than the sentimental Hitler would have treated Mussolini if he had won in 1945.’
The United States had broken the Atropos code even before Japan’s all-conquering Fujitsu computer company signed a joint-venture agreement with America’s biggest computer company in 1984. Before General Seriy had received his decoded message, Lieutenant General Henry J. Irving, Chief of Staff of the Rapid Deployment Force (known to his friends as ‘Humdinger Hank’), had got his. Minuted General Irving: ‘It is clear from decoded messages that Cuban communist forces, while pretending to lie low, will attack US convoys with missiles and aircraft as soon as they put to sea, and that attacks (possibly with biological weapons, probably with nuclear and chemical) will start against Guantanamo at that delayed moment. It is essential that America’s non-nuclear war plan be launched against Cuba from this moment, well before the Cubans strike.’
The US plan was activated. From military airports in Florida, and from the decks of Atlantic Fleet carriers, attacks were made against military and industrial targets in Cuba, with devastating effect. The weight of the attack wholly overwhelmed the Cuban air defences and caused very many casualties. A total naval blockade was imposed, cutting Cuba off from the rest of the world. US forces (particularly Cuban émigrés and Filipino mercenaries) massed to invade the island.
The United States had not anticipated the reaction of the rest of Latin America. The Secretary-General of the OAS sent an urgent message to the US President on 10 August: ‘Although all my members are in principle on America’s side in its global confrontation with the Soviet Union, I must tell you that there is general opposition and revulsion among them against the possibility of the US killing more civilians in Cuba. The Cubans have not yet launched any warlike actions against you, but you are bombing them. I beseech you to send me an instant assurance that in no circumstances will American nuclear weapons be used against Cuba, and that civilian casualties there will be kept to a minimum.’
‘Humdinger Hank’ regarded this message as appalling impudence. Fortunately, the speed of events in Europe cooled his actions before invasion of Cuba could actually take place. On the day when it became evident that the Soviet Union was breaking up, Cuba’s Economics Minister minuted to the premier: ‘Our great Soviet ally has lost this war, so let us be as sensible as General Franco was when Hitler was defeated in 1945. We have an advantage that Franco did not have in a totally de-Nazified Europe in 1945. Many of our fellow Latin American countries are allies of the US, but they are not blind servants of US national interests. They will see the Soviet defeat as a mixed blessing. They will fear that the US, free from the limitations previously imposed by Soviet power, may try to gain rigid control over its Latin American area of influence. Previous fears of “subversion from the Soviet Union and Cuba” in Latin America may now be replaced by fear of US neo-colonialism.