‘It was beautiful before the ’60s—before the devil came,’ one Cuban woman, who was imprisoned by the regime for nearly a decade, told The Epoch Times.
MIAMI—Cuban Americans are hopeful their country’s communist dictator will be the next to fall in the Western Hemisphere after the U.S. military’s successful operation to capture Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro on Jan. 3.
Cuba has been ruled by a communist regime since 1959 when Fidel Castro established a one-party system. Now, the Caribbean country is ruled by Miguel Díaz-Canel.
The Epoch Times spoke to more than 50 Cuban Americans of varying ages in Miami, who all praised President Donald Trump and the U.S. military for the capture of Maduro.
The vast majority expressed hope for similar action against Canel; a small number said patience and restraint are better; and one man described his theory of a wider scheme at play by the Trump administration.
After Maduro’s capture and the seizure of the country’s oil, the U.S. president urged Cuba to strike a deal.
But even if Trump orders a similar operation on the Cuban leader, many expatriates said it won’t be enough to rid their home country of a deeply entrenched, brutal regime or to ease the decades of suffering their people have endured.
Murder, unjust imprisonment, torture, and endless unspeakable acts are what have kept the communists in power for so long, they said.
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Oscar Perez, a U.S. Marine veteran who served three tours in Iraq, is now the president of the Cuban American Veterans Association.
He said Canel and the entire Cuban system must be disbanded, at which point he would consider visiting his parents’ home country.
“My dad, I wish he would have seen it. That was one of his main things in his life, that he wanted to see a free Cuba, and unfortunately, he couldn’t see it,” he said. “But hopefully, I do.”
He partly credits his enlistment to his Cuban-born father, a staunch anti-communist who escaped political imprisonment twice, served a 12-year sentence, and eventually faced the choice of leaving Cuba or dying. His father trekked through a jungle for 13 days, jumped a fence at Guantanamo Bay, and navigated a Cold-War-era minefield to escape his home. The first American his father met was a U.S. Marine.
Perez described how he sees and feels this sentiment of support for the U.S. military among all Cubans and Cuban Americans he interacts with. Perez said the current regime is already teetering, and with the capture of the former Venezuelan leader and the country’s oil, he theorized the Trump administration could benefit from being patient.
However, Perez praised Trump and the U.S. military operation against Venezuela and said Cubans are ready for similar, direct action to be taken.
“America’s strength, finally. We have been the global leader for many, many years—many, many decades—and we were just not using our political strength the way it should be,” Perez said.
He predicts more socialist regimes in the Western Hemisphere will topple in the near future, and that Cubans and Cuban Americans are thirsty for freedom.
By Troy Myers
