Raul Castro takes Cuba’s reins
Published 10:35 pm Sunday, February 24, 2008
HAVANA — Cuba’s parliament named Raul Castro president on Sunday, ending nearly 50 years of rule by his brother Fidel but leaving the island’s communist system unshaken.
In a surprise move, officials bypassed younger candidates to name a 77-year-old revolutionary leader, Jose Ramon Machado, to Cuba’s No. 2 spot — apparently assuring the old guard that no significant political changes will be made soon.
Raul Castro, 76, shuns the spotlight and often looks uncomfortable when he has to appear in public. Friends call him “the Prussian” for his cold, efficient style and describe his leadership as businesslike, even boring.
That’s very different from his iconic elder brother Fidel, who inspired three generations of revolutionaries worldwide and never met a grand stage he didn’t like.
Separated by five years, the pair is so different that many doubted the younger Castro could successfully govern when he assumed provisional leadership of the communist-run island on July 31, 2006. But those doubts quickly melted away.
Cuba remained calm and little-changed for nearly 19 months while Fidel Castro, now 81, stayed out of sight after intestinal surgery.
“I think that Raul is very much in charge. Obviously he’s had almost 19 months now of doing it,” said Brian Latell, a longtime CIA analyst who wrote a 2002 book about the younger Castro called “After Fidel.” “His standing with the Cuban people has improved so much, I think, just because he’s so different from Fidel.”
Raul Castro has spent nearly all of his life in his older brother’s shadow, and he showed no signs of racing to the spotlight in the moments after he was named president Sunday by Cuba’s parliament.
“There is only one commander in chief,” he said, referring to Fidel.
Raul Castro has served as defense minister since he, his brother and a band of bearded rebels toppled dictator Fulgencio Batista in 1959. The nation’s top generals are intensely loyal to Raul Castro and he has long wielded almost absolute power over as many as 50,000 active troops, and firepower that includes Soviet-era tanks and fighter planes.
“As soldiers, they are happy with a man who they know extremely well after 49 years, a man who chose many of them for top command positions and has taken care of them,” said Cuba military expert Hal Klepak of the Royal Military College of Canada.
Raul Castro, who embraced communism before his older brother did, is said to be quick with a joke and kind to those he works with, but he has a well-known tough side, overseeing the execution of political opponents following the revolution.
