Cuban Exiles Ruefully Accept a Loss to Castro

On the street where Elian lives, reality crept in like a familiar dull ache. Perhaps as early as next week, the Cuban child will go back to the communist island with his father, just as U.S. officials have insisted for months.

But to many Cuban exiles, the winner here is not the American government. And it is certainly not Elian Gonzalez.

The winner is Fidel Castro. And that’s what makes the long-expected turn of events so galling.

“We’re frustrated,” said Sergio Rioseco, 54, one of several hundred people who have spent days and often nights in front of the Little Havana home of Lazaro Gonzalez, the boy’s great-uncle. Behind police barricades, the crowd waved Cuban flags and chanted anti-Castro rhymes to show support for the Miami relatives’ fight to keep the 6-year-old boy from being returned to Cuba. “We don’t like it. Castro gets what he wants. But we have to respect the law. Violence is not the right answer.”

After Atty. Gen. Janet Reno announced Friday that custody of Elian would be given to his father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, next week, and that both could return to Cuba within days, many exiles reacted more with resignation than outrage.

Demonstrations planned for Friday afternoon--including one designed to snarl vehicle traffic at Miami International Airport--were called off. “At this point we’re putting a hold on the civil disobedience campaign, since Reno said the child would be seen by psychologists, which is something we’ve been asking for. That will give us a few more days to work out a meeting between family members,” said Ramon Saul Sanchez, a prominent exile leader.

Carefully Worded Reno Statement

The Cuban American National Foundation, the most influential lobbying group, also issued an appeal for calm. “We do not believe that this current tense situation regarding the fate of Elian Gonzalez would be best served by disruptive activities in our community,” said Chairman Jorge Mas.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush weighed in, with an appreciation of the emotions so many feel. “I think a lot of people are passionate about this because they have suffered at the hands of Fidel Castro.”

And native Miamian Reno understands that passion too. In her carefully worded statement Friday, she called Castro “a dictator from whom thousands have fled.”

One of those who fled almost 40 years ago was Rafael Soler, 79, a retired chemical engineer. He and his wife, Clara, were first-timers outside the house, moved to spend the day in the 80-degree heat, he said, by Castro’s offer to send Elian’s school desk to Washington to aid the boy’s re-integration to Cuban life.

Soler said he was an alumnus of that same Cardenas school, founded 100 years ago by Presbyterians but now run by the communist government. So in anger Soler made a sign, which he taped to a pole. The sign read, in Spanish: “The desk and the school La Progresiva do not belong to Fidel Castro.”

Few in the crowd probably understood Soler’s reference. But everyone there understood his ire. “Castro is a tyrant and a murderer,” he said.

For 41 years--since the triumph of his revolution--Castro has been the most talked-about man in Miami. He remade this city by sending the middle class into exile. And he still haunts so many of its residents.

“This is a done deal,” sighed Ledia Chavez, a beauty salon owner from Hialeah who said she was neglecting her customers to spend the day on Northwest 2nd Street in Little Havana. “But we can’t sit still when this is going on.

“We knew Castro had the power in Cuba,” she added. “But we didn’t know he had it here too.”

Public schools marked spring break this week in Miami, so many neighborhood kids came by, on foot and on bicycles to see the commotion. They walked around reading press credentials hanging from the necks of hundreds of reporters and photographers from all over the world. They stared at homemade signs: Elian protected by the Virgin; Reno with horns; pictures of Castro and Clinton as “amigos.”

The threat to send Elian home has become an emotional flash point for many in the Cuban community from the moment the boy arrived here in an inner-tube more than four months ago. In January, after immigration officials ruled that he should be returned to the island, hundreds of protesters blocked intersections, and cut off access to the Port of Miami. Dozens were arrested.

Although Miami-Dade Mayor Alex Penelas said recently that local police would not help remove the child from the Gonzalez home, police have insisted that they are prepared to handle any civil disturbances.

In the meantime, parents have been bringing their sons and daughters to the famous house, to get a glimpse of Elian on the swing set in the side yard, or just to get a taste of the raw anti-Castro fervor they had been living with all their lives.

U.S. ‘Ignorant of Life in Cuba’

“The U.S. population is ignorant of life in Cuba,” said Michael Reyes, 24, who arrived here during the 1980 Mariel exodus at age 5, the same age Elian was when he was rescued at sea in November. So intent was Reyes on showing up outside the Gonzalez house each day this week, he said, that he was fired from his job as a hotel front desk clerk.

“Castro controls everything in Cuba,” he said. “The father is being run around by Castro agents. If only he could sit down with the family around the kitchen table and work this out.”

It seemed unlikely that it would be worked out in the way that many here would like. Castro may win again. But for most exiles, the passion to oppose him will not be lost.

“I would just like Castro to know that we are not through with him yet,” said Rioseco. “If I live to be 100, I will still come out here to oppose that dictator.”