May, 2024 – On May 22, 1903, the Permanent Treaty between the governments of Cuba and the United States was signed in Havana, to specify the future relations between the two countries, which could only be modified by mutual agreement of both parties, especially the powerful neighbor.
This harmful document reproduced the first seven articles of the Constitutional Appendix, the Platt Amendment, and consolidated the dependence of the emerging republic on the neighbors’ power, granted Washington its right to intervene whenever it wished, to maintain the naval bases, and left open the possibility that the Isle of Pines would cease to be Cuban territory, among other concessions.
The Permanent Treaty signed between Cuba and the United States by the government of Tomás Estrada Palma meant nothing more than establishing on a juridical basis the eight articles of the Platt Amendment; it was the formalization of the relations of dependence and political subordination outlined by imperialism during the period of military occupation of the island and which the first submissive and surrenderist president was in charge of complying it exactly.
The signing of this onerous treaty, which indicated how relations between Cuba and the United States would be after the end of the military occupation, was a masterstroke of Yankee diplomacy and also meant a change of disguise of the popularly rejected amendment, without abandoning its leonine condition.
In 1934, and as a consequence of the popular and revolutionary resistance of the previous years against the constitutional appendix, the government of Carlos Mendieta negotiated with the U.S. the suspension of the Platt Amendment and another treaty was signed which, although it did not recognize the right to intervention, ratified the permanence of the Guantanamo Naval Base, with no time limit.
History has shown that this U.S. spot on Cuban soil not only served to attack Cuba, but also other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, and in recent years it has become an illegal U.S. prison where the most horrendous tortures are carried out, in flagrant violation of international law.
Hence the indelible demand of the Cuban government and people for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Guantanamo Bay, an illegally occupied territory, under the protection of the Permanent Treaty of Relations between the governments of Cuba and the United States, signed 122 years ago.
