Thirty years after Cuban MiG-29 fighter jets shot down two Cessnas operated by the Miami-based humanitarian group Brothers to the Rescue, killing four people, including three U.S. citizens, flying in international airspace over the Florida Straits, U.S. federal prosecutors have issued an indictment against Raúl Castro for his alleged role in authorizing the attack.

For the families of the dead, the announcement brings a measure of justice, regardless of whether Mr. Castro, 94, who was minister of defense at the time and later the head of state, ever sees a day in court. It is impossible, though, to separate the move from the Trump administration’s escalating pressure campaign against Havana over the past several months.

Since January, the United States has imposed a de facto oil blockade on Cuba with punishing humanitarian consequences, threatened sweeping new sanctions on foreign companies doing business with the island and issued direct ultimatums to Cuban officials to reform their political and economic system — or else. If the Trump administration lacked a pretext for pushing its confrontation with Havana toward military action, with the ultimate goal of regime change, the indictment may clear the way.

But the threat of a Castro prosecution in the United States also opens a window onto a larger problem that Cubans will confront in any future transition from the revolutionary government established in 1959 — especially if political change arrives through Washington’s intervention.

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How should Cubans reckon with the many injustices accumulated over nearly seven decades of revolution, exile and, yes, geopolitical conflict with their northern neighbor? How can they reconcile competing attitudes in Cuban communities toward the role of the United States in their national identity and life? Can the country afford to reopen the past if it hopes to move forward? Can it afford not to?

The choreography around Wednesday’s indictment highlights the stakes. The announcement of the indictment on May 20, Cuba’s original independence day, was calibrated to conjure larger battles over Cubans’ collective memory. The date in 1902 marked the end of four years of U.S. military occupation after the United States intervened in the midst of Cuba’s final war for independence against Spain. Washington thereafter imposed strict limitations on the island’s sovereignty as a condition for allowing Cubans to govern themselves.

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Indicting Castro Isn’t Justice

Opinion | Indicting Castro Isn’t Justice - The New York Times

Indicting Castro Isn’t Justice

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