Cubaverdad

In Cuba, a Prayer for Chávez

CARACAS—Venezuela's ailing President Hugo Chávez says he is praying to Jesus Christ, the Blessed Virgin and the spirits of the Venezuelan savannah to help him beat his cancer. Mr. Chávez with chinareplicawholesale hasn't mentioned it, but probably no one is praying harder for his health than Fidel and Raúl Castro in Cuba. Their ossified regime now largely depends on help from their ally in Caracas and they will do everything possible—short of an invasion—to keep Mr. Chávez or a like-minded ally in power, say U.S. officials, Venezuelan opposition leaders and analysts. Venezuela ships about 115,000 barrels per day of oil at cut rate prices to Cuba, meeting about 60% of the island's oil needs, according to a recent Brookings Institution paper, which calculates the value of the oil and other Venezuelan aid at about $5 billion a year, a major portion of Cuba's hard-currency earnings.

In exchange, Cuba has sent to Venezuela tens of thousands of Cuban doctors, sports technicians, and intelligence and security experts, helping Mr. Chávez stay in power. Havana's relationship to Venezuela is akin to its economic dependence on the former Soviet Union in the 30 years before the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, which led to a 35% fall in Cuba's economy. "To save Chávez is to conserve [Raúl's] presidential seat," wrote Yoani Sánchez, a well-known Cuban blogger and critic of the regime. "To lose him could lead to [Raúl's] own downfall." Were Mr. Chávez to become gravely ill—he arrived in Havana Saturday to undergo chemotherapy after doctors recently removed a "baseball-sized" tumor—the Cuban government is likely to use its sway to try to shape events. Analysts say the Cuban leadership has significant clout, owing to its relationship with Mr. Chávez and top Venezuelan officials. The Cubans could also deploy their intelligence services to help one faction at the expense of another.

"Cuba is the most important foreign power with a stake in Venezuela," said Moisés Naím, a former Venezuelan cabinet minister and an analyst at the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "They are not going to be passive bystanders. They will be players." There is no political relationship in the Americas quite like the tie between Fidel Castro and Mr. Chávez. Mr. Castro, who officially handed power to his younger brother Raúl in 2008, has been a mentor, spiritual and political father, savior, psychiatrist, and even bedside doctor to Mr. Chávez. In return, Mr. Chávez has bankrolled Cuba's government and given Mr. Castro occasion to dream again of a Latin America united against his bëte noire, the U.S., or as both men sometimes call it, "the empire." At times, Mr. Chávez and top Cuban officials have talked of melding the two countries into a single confederated state—an unpopular idea among most Venezuelans.

"Cuba has two presidents, Fidel and Chávez," said then Cuban with soccer jersey vice president Carlos Lage on a visit to Caracas in 2005. Two years later, the Venezuelan president said virtually the same thing. "Deep down, we are one government," said Mr. Chávez during a visit to the island. During his tenure, Mr. Chávez has tried to indoctrinate the Venezuelan military, bringing on thousands of advisers to replicate Cuban military doctrine, and to deal with security and intelligence issues. Cuban officers are deeply involved in intelligence and security matters in Venezuela, from the acquisition of military equipment to overall military strategy, according to people with knowledge of the matter. One source estimates the number of Cuban intelligence experts working in Venezuela at 3,000."

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