Normalizing relations with Cuba: “This was not a negotiation,, it was in fact, a unilateral decision. We didn’t want anything in return.”

4 Cuba Experts Have Differing Views on Island’s Future

Josh Siegel

When Sebastian Arcos steps back to evaluate President Obama’s move to normalize relations with Cuba, he tries to forget his own experiences with the Castro regime.

But it’s difficult for Arcos to have a clean perspective because the Cuban government’s imprints are all over his life—he spent a year in prison, and was kicked out of school, for trying to escape repression.

“My experiences have everything to do with the way I feel about it,” said Arcos, now the associate director of the Cuban Research Institute.

“I feel like I have a better grasp of the nature of the regime than the people changing the policy. They don’t know Cuba the way I do. They can look at it more objectively.”

Arcos was one of four experts on Cuba to speak at Florida International University last week at an event hosted by The Heritage Foundation. Their diverging opinions on Obama’s effort to engage Cuba, in some ways framed by their personal experiences, reflects a larger divide on the policy shift.

Ever since Obama announced a policy change that opens up the communist-ruled island to expanded U.S. travel, trade and financial activities—and restores diplomatic relations—public opinion on the move has been mixed.

The divide is especially true among Cuban-Americans, whose opinions reveal a generational split.

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