Obama Cuba Initiative Prompts New Fears of Gitmo Naval Base Giveaway State Depa

[apples]

Obama Cuba Initiative Prompts New Fears of Gitmo Naval Base Giveaway
State Department: Base return not on US agenda for talks

http://freebeacon.com/national-security/obama-cuba-initiative-prompts-new-fears-of-gitmo-naval-base-giveaway/

President Obama?s drive to normalize ties with communist Cuba is raising new concerns among security officials and experts that the administration will give up the strategic naval base at Guantanamo Bay in deal with Havana.

White House, Pentagon, and State Department officials offered assurances that the Obama administration currently does not plan to negotiate the return of the base, leased by the United States since 1903.

?I?ve not been involved in any talks on normalization in the past ? but it will not be on our agenda for upcoming talks,? Assistant Secretary of State Roberta Jacobson told the Washington Free Beacon, referring to discussions with the Cubans on the future of what the Pentagon calls Naval Station Guantanamo Bay.

U.S.-Cuba talks on normalization are scheduled for later this month. U.S. officials expect the Cuban government to demand the return of the base, located at the southeastern tip of the island, during the talks led by Jacobson.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.), a leader in Congress on scrutinizing the administration?s new Cuba policy, expressed concerns over the future of the naval base.

[jafo2010]

Marco Rubio uses his ancestry to give greater weight to his opinion.  On Cuba, I think he is out to lunch.

His arguments are at best weak, and do not reflect our foreign policy as it pertains to all other communist countries. 

I believe we should do everything we can to normalize relations.  Cuba is in our hemisphere, and the stupidity has gone on long enough.