Cubans on patrol for smugglers

For desperate Cubans, a more treacherous route
For many Cubans desperate to leave the island, but unable to secure a travel visa from the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, or to pay an expensive smuggler, there is the most dangerous alternative of all: home-made boats that are constructed quietly in shuttered buildings under cover of night.

After sundown, and with most residents in a quiet Cuban neighborhood nestled in their homes to watch soap operas on television, three men removed a large piece of stone that covered a hole on the back side of a garage. 

After making sure no one was watching, the men crawled through the hole and began working on a boat they were building inside, using old rebar for the frame.  Their plan was to sail north toward the United States, as soon as they could find an engine to power the craft.

The men said they knew what they were doing was extremely dangerous. It's also illegal under Cuban law.  When asked why he would take such a risk at sea, one man said, "Because of the economic and political situation, because here there is no future for my kids."  He added, "I'm desperate, I don't have another choice."

The long argument over who is to blame
Over the years, three basic arguments have emerged to try to explain why thousands of Cubans a year risk their lives on the unforgiving sea to reach the United States: The U.S. government blames what it describes as the abject failure of Cuba's political system and its economic and social policies. 

The Cuban government blames the U.S. trade embargo, the tightening of travel privileges for Cuban-Americans wanting to visit family members on the island and United States immigration laws which virtually guarantee political asylum to any Cuban who sets foot on American soil.

Even if they are smuggled, a Cuban stepping on U.S. soil is usually allowed to remain in the country under the "wet foot/dry foot" policy and the Cuban Adjustment Act passed by Congress in 1966. 

The third argument comes from the Cuban passengers, themselves, who give a variety of reasons for boarding the sleek smuggling boats, or making the more grueling journey on rickety home-made vessels. The most common theme appears to be a desire to improve their lives economically, to secure a better future and to reunite with family. While many will also say they are fleeing political oppression, most observers agree that basic economic needs are the inspiration for most who leave Cuba now.

Recently, NBC News asked 28 Cuban immigrants who had just arrived in Miami to describe why they left. Twelve said they left because of economic hardships, five said they were fleeing political persecution, nine said a combination of economic and political factors convinced them to leave Cuba, and two said they wanted to reunite the family members in Florida.

One of the immigrants, a former political prisoner said, "Cuba is a country that has been totally destroyed. The market doesn't exist. What's happening in Cuba isn't just a political problem, it's a problem of a non-existent freedom and future. Cuba's youth are very sad."

Cuba's foreign ministry response
Josefina Vidal, the Director of the North American Division for the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs, argued that Cubans are lured into taking dangerous trips to the United States by the promise of easy entry into the country and the special immigration privileges that stem from the Cold War. 

"The law that grants Cubans preferential treatment regardless of the means and ways they use to reach the United States territory has to be repealed," Vidal said. "And the so-called wet foot/dry foot policy has to be rebuked."

"We are willing to cooperate with the U.S. in every possible way in order to stop this problem," said Vidal. She complained about the refusal of the United States government to resume bi-annual talks on immigration issue, and to fulfill its promise this year to grant 20-thousand visas to Cubans trying to leave the country. U.S. officials say they fell short by the about 5-thousand visas this year, because of a shortage of Cuban workers needed to process the paperwork.

Vidal insisted that Cuban migrants are no different that people from Mexico and other Central American countries who try to enter the United States for economic reasons.  "Cuba is very much part of this phenomenon, of this trend of people from less developed countries trying to emigrate to more developed countries," she said.

Vidal claimed that by tightening its entry laws, the U.S. could attack the "source of the problem" and stop the Cuban immigrant smugglers. "They are dangerous for the United States, they are dangerous for Cuba, and they are dangerous for the Cuban people and the people the try to take illegally into the United States," she said.

Sadly caught in the middle
While the Cuban and U.S. governments fight their decades-long war of words, the immigrant flow increases, and the smuggling businesses continue to flourish, sometimes with disastrous results.

Maria Villalba, a middle-aged Cuban nurse, is visibly broken. As she clutched a photograph of her only son, her daughter-in-law and her nephew, she described in a quavering voice how all three of these young Cubans died last year while heading by boat for Honduras, hoping to later cross into Mexico to then head for the U.S. border.

Survivors of the ill-fated trip said the three had been swept away by huge waves and were never seen again.

Villalba shares her fate with many mothers in Cuba, Mexico and United States who have lost loved ones in accidents at sea.  "Hay muchas," she said.  There are many.

She also cautioned Cubans not to take the dangerous voyages.  "It's a crazy, crazy idea," she said.  "It wrecks your life. It wrecked mine. It destroyed my life."

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