"For us, victory means having a minimum loss of human life," said Cuban president Fidel Castro on a November 5 tour of the country's worst affected western provinces.

On November 4 the Cuban government moved some 750,000 people from their homes. Among the evacuees were 35,000 students in education farm camps in low-lying areas, 500 tourists from southwestern islands like Cayo Coco and the Isle of Youth, and the 5,500 people living in the fishing town of Surgidero de Batabanó, on Cuba's southern coast.

The mayor of Havana ordered the evacuation of 150,000 people in the city of 2 million. Residents with homes facing the ocean reinforced their windows with tape, and lashed down water tanks on their roofs. Workers and peasants organized to bring in tobacco and other crops ready for harvest.

The storm hit with devastating impact. Winds of up to 135 miles an hour, gusting to higher speeds, tore the roofs off buildings, buckled steel power pylons, and ripped trees out of the ground, while high waves and tidal surges brought widespread flooding. Eight provinces covering 45 percent of the country's area and more than half its 11 million people were affected.

Many fields of sugarcane, the source of the country's largest export crop, were flooded or destroyed. The Australia sugar mill near Playa Girón, the command post 40 years ago of the revolutionary forces that defeated the U.S.-organized Bay of Pigs invasion, was one of the sugar facilities damaged by the storm. In the days following, thousands of workers have been mobilized to save some of this year's cane crop. Banana, citrus, and coffee crops also suffered.

Many students are using improvised classrooms while repairs are being undertaken to schools, 1,500 of which were affected, and 50 of which were destroyed or extensively damaged. Cuban officials said school repairs are being prioritized in each province.

Much of the country was left without power under the impact of the storm, which knocked down 125 high-voltage pylons and flooded the central thermoelectric plant in the west. The Cuban weekly Granma International reported on November 14 that "20 percent of the central Villa Clara, Matanzas, and Cienfuegos provinces, the most damaged, are still without electricity services, a situation which...will be resolved by the end of November and in early December." Many people face a shortage of water, since it is distributed by electric-powered pumps.

By November 12 the health system was "back to normal," reported the paper.

"Material damage is significant and serious, much worse than any caused since the triumph of the revolution" in January 1959, said Carlos Lage, vice president of the Council of State. According to Granma, the Cuban leader "indicated that all necessary measures would be taken to ensure that pre-hurricane food levels would not be reduced. Short-cycle crops and vegetables will be increased and should grow substantially in volume next year."

A considerable dollar investment will be required to repair damages in the sugarcane and fruit plantations," noted the paper, adding that "all this is taking place under complex conditions created by the world economic crisis."

In the aftermath of the storm Washington sent a diplomatic note to the Cuban government, "expressing the United States' readiness to immediately assess the need for aid, with a view to possibly providing humanitarian assistance," a statement by the Cuban Foreign Ministry said. In response the Foreign Ministry said that Cuba had, "without losing a second," made "rapid and detailed assessments of all damage."

The Cuban government proposed Washington "allow Cuban public companies to purchase in an expeditious manner specific quantities of food, medicine, and raw materials to be used in reestablishing the reserves we are now using, so that we will be prepared for any new natural disaster that may emerge." The message suggested Washington allow transportation of the materials to the island in Cuban vessels.

"Payment for such products," the ministry statement explained, "given existing barriers limiting our normal trade relations, would be in cash, specifically U.S. dollars or whatever convertible currency is requested."

The Cuban Foreign Ministry statement quoted a news wire story reporting that White House spokesman Ari Fleisher said Washington "was prepared to offer aid through international organizations and other suitable intermediaries, in a way that they can be certain that the Cuban people, and not the Castro regime, will benefit."

In response to Fleisher's comments, the Foreign Ministry statement said nothing of the sort was implied in the note from Washington, and "as for the whole muddle kicked up by the White House spokesman, it's up to them to explain."

On November 15 Cuban foreign minister Felipe Perez Roque said Cuba presented a list of goods for approval by U.S. officials and has contacted 15 agricultural and pharmaceutical companies in the United States. The deal is estimated to be worth between $3 million and $10 million. At Washington's insistence, the goods will be transported on U.S. or third-country ships.

The U.S. rulers have maintained an economic embargo on Cuba since 1962. Reflecting their continuing hostility to Cuba's socialist revolution, they have extended the reach of the embargo with two major pieces of legislation, the 1992 Torricelli and 1996 Helms-Burton acts.

Soon after the storm passed, the Venezuelan government began flying in 22 tons of aid supplies, including milk powder, canned goods, pasta, and coffee.
 
 
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