MARTIN GURRI: Cuba Enters the Dark Ages.
On August 6, 1960, Fidel Castro nationalized the Cuban Electric Company and sent his minions to celebrate in the streets of Havana. The company’s logo, a lightbulb-nosed stick figure nicknamed “Calixto Kilowatt,” was paraded around in a huge open coffin. I remember watching this revolutionary ritual on Cuban TV, a young kid frightened by the macabre imagery. Castro’s propaganda was never gentle or subtle.
Fast-forward to last Friday, when the electric grid in Cuba suffered a complete collapse. This is not an exaggeration or a metaphor. The entire island went dark—even Havana, which has been protected from the worst of the recent blackouts. It was a civilizational breakdown. The economy quite literally ground to a halt, as factories and stores were ordered closed by the government. From elementary schools to universities, the educational system was put on pause. Hospitals turned people away. For three days, Cuba, already tattered and abused, entered a special circle of hell reserved for the most mismanaged nations on earth.
The material catastrophe is self-evident and can be measured empirically. The depth of human suffering is impossible to gauge from a distance. Without refrigeration, food—always hard to obtain—was spoiled. Mothers lacked milk for their children. Without fans or air conditioners, everyone, including the very young and the very old, was exposed to Cuba’s blistering temperatures. Without elevators, the old and the sick who lived in apartments were forced to sleep outdoors, in the heat and among the mosquitoes. Without traffic signals, venturing to the streets became a death-defying nightmare. Without light, the human mind itself begins to shut down—the Cuban public, frozen in place by an incompetent and antiquated regime, sank to almost metaphysical levels of hopelessness.
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After three days of calamity, power is now being restored to parts of Havana. It won’t last. Disaster by now is a progressive condition. The regime in Cuba is hardly a government: It’s a gang of incompetents who hold absolute power but have no idea what to do with it. Cuba itself is hardly a country; it’s a lifeless thing, a corpse bleeding out its best talent, inert and decaying amid the glorious beauty of the Caribbean. This situation has lasted for 65 years and shows no signs of change.
Yet we are taught by religion to believe in resurrection. The island-wide blackout, inconceivable in a modern nation, provides an omen for the future. Sooner or later, infrastructure collapse will trigger political collapse.
Some ambitious general, discerning much virtue in capitalism, will sweep away the mafia and offer himself for the presidency. The crowd in the street will enthusiastically support anything that isn’t the present regime. The Cuban people have always been talented and energetic—any who doubt this can visit Miami and see for themselves. American investment and tourism will return in force. Cuba will come back to life. But it’s been a long, long wait, and it looks like we’ll have to wait a bit longer.
Faster please; North Korea in the Caribbean needs a serious reboot.