An Interesting Case – and Dilemma
I’m serious about the title. And I’ll admit I’m somewhat torn on this one.
Decades ago, Otto Macias left Cuba. He came to the US, then enlisted in the Army.
Macias fought in Vietnam. He returned from Vietnam in 1969, allegedly “broken and suffering from PTSD and schizophrenia” per his family. It appears he really did have significant issues; he was in and out of hospitals repeatedly after his return. And the VA apparently recognized something as being service-connected; they were paying him a relatively small monthly payment. (The linked article calls it a “pension”, but I’m guessing it was some modest level of disability compensation. Macias wasn’t old enough to qualify for a veteran’s pension, and the payment was only around $60/month in 1980.)
Macias had relatives in Cuba. In 1980, he went to visit them. He stayed.
Since Cuba was under an embargo, after a relatively short period his payments from the VA also stopped. But now the US is in the process of normalizing relations with Cuba (IMO a huge mistake until Cuba ends its support for revolutionary movements worldwide) – and it’s now allowable for US funds to be sent to Cuba.
Macias has asked for his VA payments to be resumed. And though he now lives in Cuba with family and will probably stay (he’s now elderly and in bad health), he apparently doesn’t have any ill will towards the USA.
As I said, I’m a bit conflicted. Yeah, he earned that compensation through service in combat; Macias doubtless needs the money. But he’s also not living in the US, or in any friendly nation – he’s living in a country that still is a US adversary. Resuming his VA payments would help support Cuba’s economy, and would also set a precedent that I’d hate to see established. Adversaries are adversaries; as a nation, we shouldn’t be helping nations that are our enemies.
On balance my position would be, “Sorry– not if you’re in Cuba, or any one of the other nations in the world that are US adversaries.” But it’s a tough call, and I can certainly understand the opposite point of view.
Fox News has an article on Macias. IMO, it’s worth reading.
Thoughts?
Category: Foreign Policy, Veterans Issues
I’m torn on this one. I’d say give it to him if our governments policy has changed I live here in Tucson, Az
and just recently found out the VA has a clinic in Mexico and they do a muster once or twice a year there is over 25,000 vets in Sonora and I guess our government sends them money
Why not? whats 60.00 a month, that traitorous asshole Kerry just gave Iran what…a billion and a half?
Damn Good Point ^^^^^
I bet he asks for all the back payments as well!
When living in Florida, I once heard a speech given by a Cuban exile regarding getting their country back.
The number one issue was exiles sending money back to Cuba to help family left behind. The number this person gave was at least in the 7 figure range per year
So, in reality Hondo his little pension pittance is not going to have as big of an affect on the local economy…unlike the millions flowing back from the exiles.
He earned that pension in the most unfortunately way possible. If he’s as bad off as you indicate, well that pension won’t be going for that much longer anyway.
I wonder if he would be due back pay for the time of the embargo?
IMO, he earned it, which is a lot more than a lot of the scammers like Sealy McChippendale, Bernath, et al, can rightly claim.
His pension is a pittance…he served our country honorably but now chooses to live with family. I say pay what is owed him…
Like Atkron stated, Cubans exiles have been sending money back to Cuba for years. The guy served honorably; shouldn’t punish him for wanting to go back home to be with his family.
I would only be torn on this if the Cuban Govt was taxing his disability payments. If they aren’t, I don’t see an issue. Though I wouldn’t put it past a communist dictatorship to tax disability.
Am pretty hard core on giving what is earned to those who earned it no matter what they may or may not have done since earning it. Short of committing fraud against those from whom it was earned, it’s his, so it should be sent to him. Back pay as well.
Nope, we don’t have to like where it’s going, but he earned it.
Sanctions are always problematic against dictatorships for this reason: The rulers (our real enemies) don’t suffer. The people (usually not our enemies, at least not officially) do suffer. Thus, the incentive for the rulers to reform is small….especially if they control the information, and can put the blame on us. As they usually seem able to do.
(South Africa is the one “sanctions success story” I hear about…but it was a partial democracy, and the people who suffered from the sanctions had the power to vote out the policies that brought them on.)
It might still be worth it if the enemy country has something dangerous to do with the extra funds…Iran, for example, sponsors a lot of conventional terrorism, which is both relatively cheap and quite dangerous. (Hezbollah is always looking to start the next Arab-Israeli war.) A little extra cash in their pockets is always bad news, and will remain so until they seriously reform.
But Cuba’s economy, even if ruthlessly milked by its evil government, as far as I know isn’t the engine for anything dangerous to us. Thus, I don’t see the great danger even if thousands of U.S. vets were moving down there and getting their disability checks sent down. So I’d give the man his money.
(That is an important part of the analysis to me. Making a general rule based on a single sympathetic case is a bad idea, at least not until you consider “what happens when everyone else wants to do the same?”)
That’s my thought. How about you?
Well, Alberich – ever hear of Cuban support for “revolutionary movements” in Latin America and elsewhere? And/or support for the Hugo Chavez
CommunistSocialist regime in Venezuela?Historically, Cuba has been a huge agent for anti-democratic unrest worldwide. It seems there’s pretty much no leftist revolution anywhere they’re unwilling to assist – sometimes with troops, but more often with training and/or supplies. The money to procure those has to come from somewhere. And since Russia is no longer propping up the Cuban economy, any source of hard currency is even more important to the Cuban government today.
Money is fungible. Every dollar/peso/Euro/whatever in hard currency they bring in from whatever source is an additional dollar that supports their population. That in turn frees dollars to be spent on “foreign adventures”.
Were I in charge, I would tell the man he’s entitled to his payments – but that he has to return to the US to get them. And I’d also tell him no dice on taking the funds to Cuba if he wants to go back.
The US government can’t effectively control people who want to mail cash to Cuba, or otherwise deliberately circumvent US law to send money there in other ways. But the USG certainly doesn’t have to send the money there itself.
And I believe the precedent established by Fleming v. Nestor says that the USG doesn’t have to do that if it deems it contrary to US interests.
I certain did hear about Cuban support for dangerous revolutionary movements during the Cold War. (When they were receiving a massive subsidy from the Soviets.) And back then they were part of a highly dangerous worldwide alliance backed by a superpower. If that were still going on my position would be brutally simple: “Not a penny.”
I have not heard about them doing this sort of thing recently, though you may well know something I don’t. And if they are still supporting something really dangerous then I would certainly agree your position is the correct one. But from what I see (and by no means do I see it all), Communism is a spent force as a worldwide danger.
Chavez’s People’s Republic appears to be going the way of the Second World in furthering our economic education. (By showing “what not to do” and “what happens if we try”).
Pity Sanders isn’t watching…. or Obama. They seem to be about the only people in the western world who think Communist/Socialist principles are an optimal alternative. Pretty much everywhere other than Norkland has given up.
If you strapped them in a chair with their eyelids propped open Clockwork Orange-style and made them watch it, you know what their response would be…
“Oh, how terrible of us Americans to have made them suffer so! We owe them.”
Believe it or not, Brazil replaced Cuba a couple decades ago as the primary mover and shaker in the Support Commiescum Revolution Around the World scumbags.
Cuba still carries the name, but after the Fall of the Wall and the collapse of Soviet economy, that and a few soldiers for cadre are about all Cuba’s been able to provide.
Veteran’s pensions and disability are different from social security disability. With SSD, you must reside in the country to receive payments. With the state supplement to SSD, you must reside within the state to receive.
Veteran’s payments have never been border bound.
I personally find the dropping sanctions on Cuba to be just another reason to see our current POTUS as an enemy loving scumbag, but imo, the VA payments should go to the persons who earned them if there’s no embargoes or sanctions in place that would otherwise stop them.
He earned it. A few hundred bucks a month isn’t going to affect the commie regime one way or the other.
We always talk about what separates us from the bad guys, what really separates us?
Issues like this separate us, we actually can discuss this and come to understand that we might not agree on whether or not this is wise to send this money to Cuba because of a long standing disagreement with a former enemy (I say former because normalization of relations is step one into changing from enemies to at least associates even if it never becomes friendly again).
Normalization implies a serious change in relations and one where the former men and women who did serve our nation honorably and were due or awarded appropriate compensation for their injuries while serving our national interests should receive that due compensation.
He should receive what was fairly awarded, period.
One of our biggest mistakes was not normalizing relations long ago, failing to do so created a foothold in our basement for Russia.
Economics is the true power of nations, Russia saw that in the 80s when trying to outspend the US, they lacked the depth of GDP to pull it off.
We could have easily taken Cuba and dealt with them by overwhelming them economically, more Americans traveling back and forth along with commerce might have made a difference. What we did certainly made no difference so it was clearly the wrong tack.
He earned it if he served honorably. He should get back pay. There are a lot of worthless motherfuckers getting a lot more for doing a lot less.
Word ^^^^^
Quite honestly the embargo should have ended years ago after the Soviets lost the Cold War. We trade with China and Vietnam…why not Cuba at this point?
I think the only thing holding that back is pandering the Latino vote in Miami-Dade…the very same folks sending cash back to their families that is helping to the very regime they fled from.
Was it/ is it forbidden by law? If not, then send it to him. He earned it . . the hard way. My sympathies to him for trying to do the right thing, and getting traumatized for his efforts.
I don’t see it as a dilemma at all. He earned the money and our long time feud with Cuba makes little sense these days. I don’t reminisce about the “good old days” of the Cold War and I think it’s time we just let it go.
Is Cuba a bad actor in terms of human rights? Perhaps, though in this day and age I’d say they’re no worse than lots of other countries we have no difficulty supporting like Saudi Arabia.
Are they bad actors in terms of what they do in other countries? Perhaps, but, again, the Saudis have been either directly funding or assenting to the funding of radical mosques that preach hate an intolerance against the West.
The truth is that our antipathy towards Cuba is nothing but a relic of the Cold War and should go the way of other Cold War relics.
Pay him. He earned it.
I don’t even know why this is a question. He earned it, he should get it. Let’s say someone here earns a pension or disability. Should it be put at risk some time in the future if you speak out against the government? This gentleman hasn’t even done that and has been far more charitable towards the VA than I would have been. He should not only be paid…he should receive what he was unfairly denied. It wasn’t his option at the time to “choose” to leave Cuba to receive the pension he earned. I’d argue it really isn’t his choice now. He’s old. He’s ill. Who here would demand he shorten what’s left of his life and undertake the strain and effort of leaving everything he’s got and everything he knows, while ill…simply so one of you could make a political statement?
My opinion is fuck the commie rat bastard. If I served in Iraq and moved to North Korea I can still draw disability. Nah fuck that.
Its like Gagnon’s case. He served in Beirut early on. He came back and deserted not once but twice. 30 years later the pussy claims PTSD and gets disability. Plus decades of back benefits.
He can come back to get his disability, just long enough to stand in front of a firing squad.
The softer gentler me says, Phuk Hymm.
No, it’s not like “Gagnon’s case” in the slightest sense. He served voluntarily in a combat zone. His problems on return were clearly documented. He was awarded a service-connected disability. He went to Cuba to live with relatives. Why? The reasons are his to know alone…but his actions don’t suggest it was because he “hated the USA”. For all we know, he stayed there because he could afford to live there…just like many retirees move to Mexico or the Phillipines–where they spend ALL their retirement money.
There are no indications at all that he betrayed the US or did anything against our best interests. In fact…when they stopped his payments because of the embargo…and he simply accepted it without complaint…only asking they be resumed when the embargo was lifted. No drama. No fuss.
You, on the other hand, think he should be put up against the wall and shot because you don’t like where he chose to live out his life and because you think you should be the one to determine whether or not he earned what he received from honorable service.
Putting it bluntly…this man served our country honorably. More honorably than you serve yours…making statements like that.
Anyone that would move to North Korea to live right now is a traitor. They will always be a traitor. I will always treat them like a traitor. When he moved to Cuba it was the same as that is now.
Gagnon’s problems were well documented. He is a deserter, he will always be a deserter, I will always treat him as a deserter. He deserves nothing for his desertion. Either of them.
I don’t care if this guy was a member of the join chiefs of staff with a Silver Star. Phuk Hymm.
He made his choice by defecting to an enemy of the state. Phuk Hymm the commie bastard.
I did not see that he ever became a US citizen. I have much less respect for those who retire to faraway lands to spend their pensions, setting foot on US soil every five years(that’s what I recall it used to be, anyway) to retain their citizenship and all of the rights and privileges that come with it. If he’s Cuban, he’s Cuban. If he earned a disability payment in service to the US, then it’s his.
Ok, I’ll be the dick and say that there isnt enough info to go on.
There are several things that need to be cleared up. All we get in the article is his side.
He could have fled the US to avoid criminal charges.
His disability could have been any number of things at any %. A $60 a month pension in 1980 was probably in the 30-40% range.
He could have been drawing TEMPORARY disability based on a condition that could improve.
If he has a permanent condition that was documented by the VA before he left then sure reenstate his pension.
2016-1980=36×12=432×60=25920.
A stunning $26K not counting annual adjustments for inflation. A pittance to us, a windfall for him.
Pay the man.
Apparently I am a simpleton as I see things that some would consider a jaded perspective. Were I the dude, the first order of business would to somehow get my relatives out of the shit hole known as Cuba. That might include the requirement to pay for the freedom to move family members North. Anyone who has been to Miama since the mid-seventies can attest to the reality that Miami is, in fact, Cuba North. The dude went to RVN not knowing if he’d return or not. Since back, why in the world would any reasonably intelligent person choose to return to Cuba knowing the sacrifices and personal costs involved? It may be it is entirely more difficult and risky than what I would hope. Think of all the Mexicans living and working here in the U. S., spending very little of their money and sending the bulk back home to relatives. If this dude were to stay Stateside and save & scrimp, he surely could save just enough to get his relatives on the 50 mile trip with very little trouble. Who am I to call anyone a fool for wanting to return to the old home area? But with THOSE persecutions and living conditions, who in their right mind would want to return to THAT sort of lifestyle? Give the man what he rightfully earned. But also some friendly advice on how to get his family out of Cuba. From another perspective, if you start sending him money to Cuba, the next thing you’ll see is a bunch of “whatevers” wanting to return to Africa and further sit on their collective asses doing what generations have been doing in the States. That of course, is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. Let those who want to stay and act civilized remain here. Properly done in masse, that per se, could bring this country to a much happier and considerate place to live. Bottom line is this: I’d FAR RATHER see compensation go to someone who fought and suffered for it, as opposed to the entitlement crowd who seek their payment from “The… Read more »
Pay him, and thank him for his service. Most of us have seen hundreds of fakers on this site and elsewhere who finagle bennies from the VA and elsewhere. (Anyone remember the $30K deck?) Here’s a guy who actually served and earned the disability payment. He earned it regardless of were he presently lives. Isn’t it convenient the government can cite the regs when it is convenient to do so? I do agree with the above comment recommending he get his family out of that utopia.