Earlier this week, we noted that Cuban prosecutors plan to finally try an American citizen (and USAID subcontractor) held in Cuba during what appears to have been an exhaustive 14 month investigation for crimes against "the independence or territorial integrity of the State."  They plan to seek a 20 year prison sentence.

Right on the heels of that announcement, someone slipped Cuba's most celebrated independent blogger Yoani Sanchez - "Viva el Cubaleaks!" writes Sanchez - a copy of a Cuban Ministry of the Interior briefing describing how the United States's war against Cuba has moved into cyberspace.  In this video, the MINIT briefer describes how, since at least 2008 (and, notably, even today under the Obama administration) the United States has actively sought to place satellite communications networks in Cuba free from Cuban government control and recruit Cubans to maintain them.    And, right on the heels of that leaked video being posted by Yoani on her blog, Yoani now reports that the Cuban government has ceased blocking access to her blog from the island.

That's a lot of drama and intrigue for one week, but chances are this is only the beginning.  As Phil Peters notes in his excellent analysis of the MINIT video, this video looks less like a leak and more like the Cuban government's opening statement in the upcoming trial of Alan Gross.  (All the more ironic that the video was leaked to Yoani Sanchez, one of the subjects treated in the video and a blogger the Cuban government considers to be "manufactured" by the U.S. and allies in Europe.)  For those who want to skip the video, and even the transcription at Cafe Fuerte, or the translation available at Translating Cuba, and just get a synopsis of the main messages in the video, then I recommend you hop over to The Cuban Triangle here and  here.  Here's a taste of that analysis:

If you read the transcript, what Cuban government messages can you derive? I think they are these:

• To Latin American governments and publics, and beyond: “Obama is no different than Bush; same economic sanctions against Cuba, same attempts to bring down our Revolution.”

• To friendly governments: “You might want to check what USAID is up to in your country.”

• To international public opinion: “We have young people who are smart, tech-savvy, and as committed as any historico to defending Cuba.”
• 
  
  To USAID and its contractors and President Obama: “We’ve got your number."

The U.S. government's response to the Cuban prosecutors' announcement?  It "compounds the injustice suffered by a man helping to increase the free flow of information, to, from and among the Cuban people."  A 20 year sentence certainly sounds pretty stiff.  (But, as one reader pointed out earlier this week, the Cuban Five, five unregistered Cuban agents who infiltrated militant and anti-Cuba groups in South Florida ended up with extremely harsh sentences.)  But part of the injustice Gross is suffering stems precisely from the fact that we sent a civilian into hostile territory without considering what would happen if the "enemy" would stop tolerating this kind of activitiy. 

As many know by now, Cuba has laws on the books specifically criminalizing U.S. government-funded or directed activities on the island, such as Mr. Gross's, that derive from the 1996 Helms-Burton law, which focused on how to bring down the Cuban government.  It's just not sufficient to throw your hands up and say, he was just there trying to help the Cuban people get information and expect the Cuban government to "get" that.  The trial won't turn on whether the Cuban people get enough information or deserve to get more; it will turn on whether the U.S, government has the right to send people to the island to set up networks beyond the regulatory control of the Cuban government.  Like the Cuban government or not, no government in the world would tolerate another country funneling advanced communications technologies to its citizens without first checking in with the host government - no matter how noble the cause.

Gross's legal team seems to have grasped that fact, and I suspect they hope to prove, in and out of that court room, that he's an insignificant player in a game he wasn't even aware he was playing. 

"The charges announced today by the Cuban authorities against him demonstrate once again that Alan is caught in the middle of a long-standing political dispute between Cuba and the United States," said the lawyer, Peter J. Kahn. "Alan and his family should not have to pay the price for more than 50 years of turmoil in U.S.-Cuba relations."