260 THE POLITICS OF INTERVENTION
one another, as if each Cuban was the natural enemy of
all other Cubans."^55
Varona thought the remedy "for our evils" should be sought
in "a change in our internal political organization," rather
than in a "change in the form of our relations with the United
States " Whatever Roosevelt's good intentions, he could
not alter the basic facts of Cuban-American relations, for the
only way to do that "would be to push the island several
thousand leagues out in the Atlantic and outside the radius
of the influence of the United States." Varona's interpretation
of the United States duty under these circumstances reflected
the characteristic ambivalency of the Cuban-American dia
logue: Roosevelt must "guarantee in a permanent manner
... peace on the island, and the right to labor undisturbed
and acquire wealth by all licit means."
56
The intervention, as Enrique Barbarrosa saw it, was to a
large degree the fault of the United States, whose economic
policy was to dominate Cuba. In the resulting social disinte
gration, "the force of circumstances... made Uncle Sam
give the disconsolate virgin of America, full on the face, the
kiss of intervention." The occupation that followed proved
but one thing: "One cannot establish a rich and free
government with a nation of beggars."^57
The thrust of Cuban criticism was well aimed, for it was
not so critical of the intervention itself as of the occupation
that followed. Disregarding the annexationists and the xeno
phobes, the Cuban nationalist interpretation of the occupation
is best summarized by Herminio Portell Vila. Writing in
the first period of the Batista dictatorship, Portell Vila
criticized the Magoon government for ignoring the impact
of American policy on Cuba's economic growth, while it
wrongly attributed Cuban apathy toward the nation's prob
lems to a fundamental lack of national character. Portell Vila
believed this apathy was a result of American policy which
had frustrated the Cuban Revolution.^58 Magoon's administra
tion had done nothing to dispel the notion that government
was the foremost national industry. By dealing sympathetically
with the politicos, rather than using Cubans who were "able,