President of Cuba Miguel Diaz-Canel and Russian President Vladimir Putin attend an unveiling ceremony of a monument to Fidel Castro in Moscow on Nov. 22.
Photo:
sergei savostyanov/kremlin pool//Shutterstock
last week unveiled a new statue in Moscow honoring the late
Fidel Castro.
Behind the flowery language exchanged with Cuban President
Miguel Díaz-Canel
was a bracing reminder of how the Russian sees the world.
Castro, said Mr. Putin, did not allow Cuba to “be broken by the intervention of mercenaries, sanctions, financial or economic embargo, or attempts at external isolation; they upheld Cuba’s right to its own development model in accordance with national rather than externally imposed values; and made sure that the world takes into account Cuba’s opinion and respects its interests.”
In other words, in praising his fellow dictator Mr. Putin was praising himself. Mr. Díaz-Canel returned the favor by endorsing Mr. Putin’s pretext for sending troops to Ukraine when he spoke before Russia’s parliament. “The reasons for the current conflict in this zone must be sought in the aggressive policy of the United States and the expansion of NATO towards Russia’s borders,” he said.
Mr. Putin hailed Castro as the “colorful and charismatic” founder of the modern Cuban state. That at least he got right. But the sad reality of the modern Cuban state is that Castro and Communism reduced a talented and educated people to one of the poorest nations in the Western hemisphere. The world gets an occasional glimpse of this privation when uprisings break out against the regime—followed by the usual arrests and trials.
There’s another parallel that Mr. Putin doesn’t speak about. Despite his modest salary, some claim that Mr. Putin controls wealth that makes him the richest man in the world. One of Castro’s former, longtime…
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