Journey for a Homebody

WELCOME TO YOUR HOME: CHILE Said the cheery banners at Santiago's Pudahuel airport. From the start of his two-week visit, Cuba's Fidel Castro did not seem to be at home at all. A 21-gun salute boomed out as he walked down the ramp of his four-jet llyushin, but the speech that Castro had labored over on the long flight from Havana stayed in the pocket of his olive-green fatigues. Silenced by Chilean protocol, which allows only heads of state to deliver arrival addresses (as Cuba's Premier, Castro is technically only a head of government), Fidel met his host and old friend President Salvador Allende Gossens with a mumbled request: "Tell me what to do."

Evidently, Allende did just that. It was Castro's first appearance anywhere outside Cuba in seven years, and his first in South America in twelve.* But instead of playing to the grandstand, Castro kept pretty much to himself, which was apparently just what his host had prescribed. Castro spent two quick days laying wreaths and touring factories in Santiago, then set off on an extensive trip covering the spiny Andean country's entire 2,600-mile length. Everywhere he went, Castro ducked reporters, protesting that he was "under protocol."

There were occasional flashes of the familiar Fidel. Three hundred Cubans had been brought in to augment the Chilean security setup, so one newsman jestingly asked Castro if he was wearing a bulletproof vest, too. "Oye, it is as hot here as it is in Havana," he shot back. "I don't even wear an undershirt." But Castro plainly failed to arouse much excitement. When he arrived, a crowd of some 750,000 Chileans lined the streets of Santiago, chanting "Fidel, Fidel, give those Yankees hell!" Bigger and more enthusiastic crowds had turned out for Charles de Gaulle in 1964 and Queen Elizabeth in 1968. In Antofagasta, where there are three universities, Castro drew only 400 to a student rally.

Still Wary. In Chile, as elsewhere in Latin America, Castro seems a trifle outmoded. His heavy dependence on the Russians has won him no admirers, and his Sierra Maestra style is considered anachronistic by those who follow the smooth urban guerrillas of Uruguay and the business-suited Marxists of Allende's Chile. Even so, he is gaining ground; Peru may soon become the second Latin American country to re-establish diplomatic relations with Cuba. Chile did so a year ago, Mexico has maintained relations with Havana all along, and Argentina and Venezuela may follow. The result could be a rapid erosion of the isolation that was imposed on Cuba in 1964, when Castro's attempt to export revolution to Venezuela was exposed and the Organization of American States invoked trade and diplomatic sanctions against Havana.

For the moment, however, the main effect of Castro's trip has been to accentuate the political polarization in the region. Cuba is still considered a menace by many Latin American governments, notably Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil, Bolivia and Guatemala. They take his Chilean junket as the signal for a general broadening of a Communist wedge in Latin America.

Even Cuba's new-found friends in Latin America are still somewhat wary of Castro. Though his anti-Yanqui posturing has appeal, the dictatorial image of his country does not sit well, especially with the democratic Chileans. Allende has been at pains to emphasize that "I am a personal friend of Fidel Castro, but our methods, tactics and strategy are different." The head of Peru's left-wing junta, General Juan Velasco Alvarado, plans to greet Castro when the Premier stops off in Lima on his way back to Cuba, but perhaps not with fully open arms. Last week police moved to break a violent two-week strike by 12,000 workers at Peru's U.S.-owned Cerro de Pasco copper mines by force of arms; the fighting left five dead and 16 wounded, including six policemen. The junta blames the trouble on "extreme-left agitators," many of whom are thought to have received their inspiration--and perhaps more--from Havana.

No Reason. Though there is nothing like unanimity toward Castro among the Latin lands, is it time for the U.S. to reconsider its policy of isolation of Cuba? Advocates of a policy shift argue that much of Latin America will soon normalize its relations with Cuba, partly because Cuba's nationalism has come into general vogue and also because no one wants to be taken by surprise should Washington spring a China-style reversal on Cuba.

The fact is that there is no compelling reason for such a turnabout on Cuba as there was on China, which had drastically moderated its policies in the two years before Richard Nixon's trip was announced. Castro seems either unwilling or unable to cease firing those big-bore anti-American blasts. Last April Nixon suggested that U.S. policy toward Cuba could change if Havana renounced its policy of violent intervention throughout Latin America. Castro's reply was a salvo at Washington's "cop-like Government" and the OAS, which he dismissed as "a filthy, rotten bilge with no honor." There the matter rests.

* Cuba's homebody Premier has journeyed outside his country only five times since becoming Premier: to the U.S. for a speaking tour shortly after he came to power in 1959, to Argentina and Uruguay a month later, to New York City and the United Nations in 1960, to Moscow in 1963 and 1964.

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