The Cuban Spy Who Infiltrated Brothers to the Rescue

"There's a term in aviation called the point of no return. When you're going to steal a plane, you have to look at the circumstances and get to the point where you decide whether to go or not," said René González, member of the Cuban Five.

"José Basulto called to launch Brothers to the Rescue. Ferrer told him: 'I'm here with the guy who stole a plane in December.' Basulto asked me to join," González said.

"So I joined Brothers to the Rescue," he added.

"When we're talking about trying to buy a fighter jet or testing anti-personnel weapons to be dropped in Cuba, you have to ask, how long does Cuba have to keep giving in? I think Raúl's indictment is meant to push things toward aggression and war, toward the invasion they've always wanted," González said.

"When people hear the name René González, they think of the Cuban Five. They think of intelligence agents, they think of the Cuban spy. What's your real story?" asked Liz Oliva Fernández, journalist with Belly of the Beast.

"Maybe it's all three. I've always considered myself a Cuban of my generation. I'm a direct product of the Cuban Revolution, of its first generation. We grew up in a country that was defending itself against U.S. aggression while trying to build a better society," González said.

"We grew up amid the enthusiasm of those early years of the Cuban Revolution, when so many things were done for the benefit of the Cuban people. Most of us witnessed the effects of those aggressions firsthand and grew up under their impact," he continued.

"Then we joined the defense of the Revolution, from whatever position we were in. I became a teacher at 17, then I did my military service, and I served in Angola. I think I'm all of those things at the same time," González said.

"I probably never imagined becoming a spy, or an agent, whatever you want to call it. I was a Cuban citizen in the 1980s. I had built a career. I was starting a family, until one day someone came to my house and offered me a job with State Security," he said.

"How is an intelligence agent recruited? How does one become an intelligence agent?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"I was a pilot, married, with a one-year-old daughter. One day, I was asked to meet at a public place. A colleague was waiting for me at the entrance and he invited me to take a walk with him. He proposed the possibility of working for Cuban intelligence. At that moment, he told me to think it over, that I didn't have to give an immediate answer, and that if I said no, it wouldn't be a problem. I could go on with my normal life," González said.

"But my life experience didn't allow me to think about it. I told him yes. If it was necessary to work for the intelligence service, then I was willing to do it. I didn't give it much thought at the time. I simply accepted," he said.

"Several years passed with different periods of preparation for the mission, until finally, in December 1990, I stole a plane and arrived in the United States," González said.

"What does becoming an intelligence agent actually entail? Was your family aware of the work you were doing, or did you have to keep that part of your life secret? How does that work in practice?" the journalist asked.

"It was hard. My family was never aware and I had to lie to them. Fortunately, I didn't have to become a counter-revolutionary here in Cuba," González said.

"Rather, I gradually became someone disillusioned with things, someone who complained. I stepped away from the Communist Party," he continued.

"That kind of behavior that some may find surprising, but that doesn't necessarily imply a break with the Revolution, or the government or society as a whole," González added.

"I'd say the most difficult thing for me while I was here was leaving the Communist Party," he said.

"Didn't that raise any suspicions among your colleagues?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"People noticed it, it caught their attention, but I think we did it in a sufficiently subtle way," González said.

"Because the other part was that I had to continue flying in order to steal the plane," he added.

"What was your job at that point?" the journalist asked.

"I was a sports aviation pilot. We were responsible for training sport pilots in gliding, aircraft without an engine, and we also provided introductory training to cadets who were going on to become fighter pilots," González said.

"And we also dropped skydivers, which was another activity that was very popular in Cuba," he added.

"But as part of the process of becoming disillusioned, I was asked to leave that job. I went out into civilian life and did other jobs. I loaded cargo at an agricultural collection center, and later in a warehouse of Cubanacán corporation. However, I maintained my connection with aviation," González said.

"I held all my licenses. Sometimes I was called up under my sports license to participate in a skydiving competition as a pilot, or I'd simply go and fly as a volunteer," he said.

"How did you actually steal a plane? Was it all an act or was it real?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"No, I really had to steal the plane. When they gave me the mission there were fewer flights happening, especially in aviation sports, because the Special Period was starting. Supplies were starting to run out, fuel was running low," González said.

"All the pilots wanted to fly and they were competing for flight hours. It was getting harder to get your hands on a plane. In fact, I spent about three months trying to steal the plane," he continued.

"If they had told me a year earlier, it would have been very easy for me, because until 1989 you could fly all over the country on your own. You'd file a flight plan and just go. You could fly without any problems," González said.

"There's a term, in aviation, called the point of no return. When you're going to steal a plane, you have to look at the circumstances and get to the point where you decide whether to go or not, because if you go beyond that point, you can't return," he said.

"I made several attempts, several approaches. But I'd reach the point of no return and realize I couldn't go through with it because it wasn't going to work and I'd have to turn back. I'd come home exhausted from the tension, but also relieved. I'd think: 'I get to be with my family a few days,' until the next time," González said.

"Until finally, on December 8, 1991, I finally managed to steal a plane," he added.

"How was that day? Do you remember what you did after you woke up?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"Of course, there are days you never forget. That morning I got up early to take skydivers up, and it was drizzling. I remember when I left the house and said goodbye to my wife. I can still see her standing there in the hallway, even the dress she was wearing. I left, and we drove to the San Nicolás de Bari airfield," González said.

"When I arrived and went up to the control tower, my colleague in the control tower wasn't sure whether he wanted to fly, but there was already a crew in the air. Since he lived nearby, I convinced him to leave and let me take over the tower," he continued.

"That was one pilot less in my way. I stayed in the control tower directing flights until around midday, a cold front started moving in. The skydivers were making rough landings because of the wind, and the pilots told me they were going to take a lunch break," González said.

"And right then, it occurred to me that I could steal the plane. I asked how much fuel they had. He said 400 liters. I did the math in my head. That was exactly enough to reach Key West," he said.

"Before coming down from the tower, I had an idea. I removed the microphones from the telephones, and hid them behind some drawers, leaving the phones unusable," González continued.

"The person in charge of the skydiving, seeing the bad weather, decided to cancel the jumps for the day. I volunteered to park the plane at its anchor point and that was the moment I seized to steal the plane. Right in front of everyone. It was actually quite traumatic," he said.

"Since I had cut the phones, I bought myself some time," González added.

"I gave the plane full throttle, heading for the runway. From a piloting standpoint, that was a mistake," he said.

"The plane reared up. It jumped like a horse," González continued.

"The wind was coming from the north and created lift too early. What I did was raise the wings and the plane went up sideways. I said to myself: I'm in the air. I checked the instruments and prepared the plane for flight. I had the route already studied toward Key West," he said.

"I crossed the Yumurí Valley, passed through Santa Cruz del Norte, reached the coast near Jibacoa, and set course for Key West," González added.

"When you reached the point of no return, what was the first thing that went through your mind?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"By that point I wasn't thinking. It's exhausting. I left with the rear door open," González said.

"Didn't they chase you?" the journalist asked.

"A border guard plane had taken off. But a layer of low clouds protected me. Also I flew just above the water to avoid the radars. All that gave me time to get away without major problems," he said.

"How did they receive you in the U.S.?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"I was born there. In my flight book, I had hidden my birth certificate inside the cover. When I landed in Key West, I was received by the airport authorities. The first thing I did was tear open the cover and show them the certificate. They didn't know what to do with me," González said.

"They said: 'This guy is American. We can't put him through immigration,'" he continued.

"So the base commander spoke with a Key West resident of Cuban descent. They contacted my grandmother who lived in Florida, near Tampa, in Sarasota," González said.

"Was your family still in the U.S.?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"Yes. I have strong family roots in the United States," he replied.

"My grandmother had already settled there. My mom was there and my father had gone over to play baseball. My mother's family was all in the U.S.," González added.

"What was your mission at that moment?" the journalist asked.

"As part of my preparation here in Cuba, I studied the pilot groups in Miami dedicated to anti-Cuban activities. One particularly important group was CUPA, the Cuban American Pilots Association, formed by Batista-era pilots, some of whom had taken part in the Bay of Pigs invasion and another group of pilots who had served as mercenaries in the Congo," González said.

"The first thing I did, after spending a few months in Sarasota, once I got to Miami, was get in touch with CUPA," he continued.

"I introduced myself as the pilot who stole the plane, and they connected me with Ferrer," González said.

"When I was with Ferrer, he didn't waste any time. I arrived at his house and he began asking me about something that, at the time, was an advanced idea: launching an unmanned aircraft against a target in Cuba, guided by remote control," he said.

"Like a drone," Oliva Fernández said.

"Yes, like a drone," González replied.

"A bit of a crazy idea, but they were always coming up with those kinds of ideas. In the middle of that conversation with Ferrer, analyzing the pros and cons of that idea, José Basulto happens to call him to tell him Brothers to the Rescue would be launched the next day," he continued.

"Ferrer told him: 'Here with me is the guy who stole a plane in December.' And Basulto asks me to join," González said.

"So I joined Brothers to the Rescue after that visit with Ferrer," he added.

"What was Brothers to the Rescue?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"Brothers to the Rescue was an organization that has recently been back in the spotlight due to the indictment of Raúl Castro," González said.

"The organization was created by José Basulto and another former member of the CIA infiltration teams, Billy Schuss, who were trained in terrorism, sabotage, psychological warfare. All those things were part of the CIA training in the 1960s, in the context of the Bay of Pigs invasion. During the invasion, they were infiltrated in Cuba trying to unite the counter-revolutionary groups and coordinate their activities on behalf of the CIA," he continued.

"When you say they already had people infiltrated in Cuba, you're referring to members of the organization?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"What I mean is that the people who founded Brothers to the Rescue in 1991 were the same people who had infiltrated Cuba and were working for the CIA in Cuba in 1961 and had received all the training," González said.

"In 1991, as the rafter crisis began to grow, driven by Cuba's economic crisis, they came up with a brilliant idea: create an organization to rescue rafters," he continued.

"But within the organization there was also this core group that didn't have much to do with rescuing rafters. Basulto, Billy Schuss, and a few others saw the organization as a vehicle for positioning themselves in whatever might eventually happen in Cuba," González said.

"We must remember that at that time, for all those people, the revolution was nearing its end. It was going to fall in any moment. The Soviet Union had fallen, the Eastern bloc was collapsing, Cuba was entering a deep crisis. They said: 'This is our chance,'" he said.

"José Basulto, after the Bay of Pigs, returned to the U.S. and sometimes he did terrorism on his own. One time in August 1962 he came in a boat and bombed the Rosita de Hornedo Hotel, here in the north of Havana," González continued.

"Fortunately there were no deaths. He came again with two boats, and a 20-millimeter cannon and fired several rounds at the building. I was a child then. I remember that Havana woke up shaken by the attacks. In the 1960s anything could happen here," he said.

"Anyway, they founded Brothers to the Rescue," González said.

"Brothers to the Rescue originally attracted a lot of attention because they rescued rafters and that's true. They saved many rafters," he continued.

"But this core group never stopped thinking about their other objectives. When the organization was founded and they started to save rafters, they started making themselves known inside Cuba. They were getting a foothold," González said.

"As allies for those people who wanted to leave the country," Oliva Fernández added.

"Exactly," González said.

"People who wanted to emigrate to the United States and saw the sea as their only way out," Oliva Fernández said.

"Exactly. They used it very well as a propaganda tool against Cuba, because there were journalists from all over the world. They wanted to show how communism made people leave. As propaganda against Cuba it worked very well and made Basulto a well-known figure in Miami," González said.

"I remember the first flight I made with Basulto when the organization was created. He invited me to fly with him on his plane. And when we came back we went to lunch. He was very interested in what was happening inside Cuba, the morale of the Cuban population," he continued.

"What people thought of the government, especially people in the military. He was always drawn to the issue of the military, because he always hoped the Cuban military would join them in a coup against Fidel," González said.

"But remember, they live in a bubble of lies. Since 1959, they have been misled. The propaganda in Miami is very strong and they are completely alienated from the reality of Cuba," he added.

"It's like they're disconnected from what's happening here?" Oliva Fernández said.

"Exactly. You can see now how bad things are in Cuba. Well, they think it's four times worse. But you have to tell them that. Because that's the other part I learned quickly. If you don't tell them that, you're a communist. You have to magnify the country's problems. If you don't magnify the country's problems, then they suspect you. If you magnify them, then they believe you," González said.

"I'll give you an example. One day we were talking about Angola and someone asked me how many died there. Cubans? Yes. I told them it was between 2,000 and 3,000. They were offended. 'So few?' And then I said: 'That's what I know.' And I started talking with them about it, how the municipalities held funeral services for all the dead who were brought back. And they said: 'No,'" González said.

"And suddenly I realized, I had to change my approach. I started to roll with what they were saying, until we finally agreed there were about 30,000 deaths. That's when I realized, you have to say what they want to hear," he continued.

"And I think that this phenomenon operated in the mentality of Basulto during all those years. He always thought that things were worse," González said.

"The first hint I got of an activity that wasn't related to the rafters was when Basulto consulted me with a map of Cuba and the electrical grid, asking where a light plane with explosives could be landed to destroy high-voltage towers," he said.

"That was in August 1992. He was considering actions that could worsen the situation in Cuba. Imagine with the power outages we were having at that time, taking down high-voltage towers," González added.

"At the same time, the Cuban American National Foundation was working on a scheme to buy in Czechoslovakia printing plates for Cuban currency to print money and introduce it in Cuba," he said.

"Inflation," Oliva Fernández said.

"Exactly. They're all operating with the same idea: things are bad in Cuba, we need to make them worse. It's not different than it is now, but time keeps passing and they keep coming up with new ideas," González said.

"In 1994, an organization was created, CAMCO, Cuban American Military Council, which brought together some soldiers who had deserted, and people like me, who weren't military, but were pilots," he continued.

"They included Rafael del Pino, a general who betrayed Cuba and stole a plane some time before me," González said.

"So you weren't the first?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"No. They included Erneido Oliva, an officer of Batista, who was a leader of the 2506 Brigade. They created CAMCO. I remember when the organization was created, we had a meeting in which Basulto brings a manifesto and in that manifesto, he said that CAMCO supports terrorism as a weapon against Cuba," González said.

"What's funny is that the Cuban spies convinced him not to write that. We said to him: 'Brother, why would you put that? You're going to expose yourself, don't say that in public. We can end up doing it, but don't say it in public.' Finally, he agreed and took it out of the manifesto," he continued.

"CAMCO was created and then they began to escalate their activities and violate Cuban airspace. The first violation took place on April 17, 1994, in commemoration of the Bay of Pigs invasion. We went in several planes and got within three miles of Havana," González said.

"We dropped smoke bombs, flares, a whole fireworks show off Havana," he added.

"You were on one of those planes?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"Of course. I was there. Basulto was in his plane, and there were some other pilots," González said.

"In Havana, they knew that was going to happen?" the journalist asked.

"Yes, we warned them. There are images of what we did, images of us dropping smoke bombs, the MiGs circling us, Basulto pretending to speak to the MiGs, which was faked because the frequency isn't the same," González said.

"Because that incursion began a new type of anti-Castro warfare: stage a spectacle in Cuba, then return to Miami and throw a party," he continued.

"And be welcomed as heroes," Oliva Fernández added.

"When the immigration agreement between Cuba and the U.S. happened, they realized that their business was over," González said.

"What was the immigration agreement?" the journalist asked.

"If the U.S. found a rafter, they would send them back to Cuba. They would no longer allow rafters to enter the U.S. So in May 1995, Cuba and the U.S. signed the immigration agreement. And then they took to the streets in protest against the immigration agreement," González said.

"That was absurd if you care about the welfare of the rafters. The agreement allowed the U.S. to grant 20,000 visas for Cubans to go there. There were no more rafters," he added.

"They weren't coming on sinking boats anymore," Oliva Fernández said.

"Exactly. They were coming on planes," González replied.

"On planes," Oliva Fernández said.

"But their business collapsed. And then the type of action they started in April 1994, became their main activity against Cuba, which was to make incursions, provoke, seek a confrontation between Cuba and the U.S.," González said.

"They continued with the provocations. There was the flotilla of July 1995, highly publicized. We were there, and were greeted with a party in José Martí Park," he continued.

"What did they do in the flotilla?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"They announced the boats were going to enter seven miles into Cuban territorial waters. The Cuban government said it wouldn't allow it. So we joined the flotilla on our planes. The day before we left, I was talking to Billy Schuss. I was curious and I asked him: 'Hey, how far are we going to get?'" González said.

"And he told me up to the Malecón, while the ships would enter Cuban waters and challenge the Cuban Border Guard. It was the first time Basulto flew over the Malecón and started dropping flyers," he continued.

"On our planes we did all sorts of crazy things. We buzzed the Cuban ships, passing right by the masts. My family, when they saw me on the plane, told me they almost had a heart attack. But that was all part of the escalation," González said.

"Create an international incident," Oliva Fernández said.

"Exactly. That continued throughout 1995. Basulto, who was always thinking about what would happen in Cuba, created another plan, to design an anti-personnel weapon to be launched in Cuba in case something like the July 11 protests happened," González said.

"All of this was happening before the shoot-down. That's why when people talk lightly about the shoot-down, they don't realize we're not just talking about a humanitarian organization, we're talking about something else," he said.

"In January 1996, a month before the shoot-down, they did one last massive leaflet drop. They set the whole stage. They dropped flyers over Havana again. And when they returned, Basulto went to Radio Martí. On Radio Martí they did a very friendly, funny interview, because all this was treated as entertainment," González said.

"They asked Basulto if he wasn't afraid that the Cuban Air Force would react, defending Cuba's sovereignty. Basulto, laughing, said that Cuba's planes don't have enough fuel to act and he didn't care about that," he continued.

"Cuba had already sent 16 diplomatic notes to the U.S. government, they begged for the U.S. to stop Basulto's activities. In the messages exchanged between the State Department and the FBI, the FBI was alarmed by Basulto's provocations. They said that at any moment Cuba was going to shoot down one of those planes," González said.

"And indeed on February 24, 1996, two Brothers to the Rescue planes were shot down," he added.

"What were those planes doing that day? Did you know the shoot-down was going to happen?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"No. I didn't know that. Everyone knew it could happen at any time. By that point, everyone knew it could happen. But it's one thing to know that something can happen, and another thing when it actually does," González said.

"They left around noon. And then it occurred. They crossed the 24th parallel, the area of Cuban air traffic control. They announced that they were at the 24th parallel, that they were flying south and the Cuban controller warned them that the area was active, that there were military exercises," he continued.

"Basulto replied with one of his usual political speeches: 'We are free Cubans and as free Cubans we have the right to enter and we know the risk we're taking, but we're ready to face it,'" González said.

"They continued toward Cuba and that's when two of the Brothers to the Rescue planes were shot down. Basulto escaped," he said.

"The other people who came with Basulto were aware of the risk?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"I think that the men who died were not aware of all that Basulto had been planning, nor of the other actions that had nothing to do with rescuing rafters," González said.

"I think they were victims of the media hype. I didn't know them very well. There were actually two pilots, Carlos Costa and Mario de la Peña. The others were a rafter, poor guy, who was rescued, and in gratitude, wanted to fly with them. Pablo Morales. The other one was a figure in Miami, son of a government minister under Batista," he said.

"What happened on February 24 is a haze in terms of where it happened. The two governments' versions are contradictory, except for the fact that Basulto's plane was in Cuban airspace. The U.S. admits Basulto entered Cuban airspace. And they agree with Cuba on that," González said.

"Cuba says that the three planes were in its airspace and the U.S. says that the two that were shot down were outside Cuban airspace. I really haven't seen any conclusive evidence of that. There was a lot of evidence presented at the trial," he continued.

“We demanded that the U.S. submit satellite images, which would have been the most accurate thing, and they refused," González said.

"Our expert did a very good job with what he was able to obtain: the audio of the Cuban pilots, the audios of Brothers to the Rescue, the video of Basulto on board his plane, the audio of Basulto, which he erased parts of on the way back to the U.S.," he added.

"Some things survived. Still our expert couldn't specify the exact place of the shoot-down. That's the reality," González said.

"What's your personal opinion of the shoot-down?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"I think Cuba had the right to do it," he replied.

"Cuba had warned, several times, sending 16 diplomatic notes. Fidel sent García Márquez to see Clinton to ask him to stop the flights," González said.

"The history of the activities of Brothers to the Rescue forced Cuba to defend itself. Regardless of whether they were saving rafters, their actions were escalating and pointing toward violence," he continued.

"When we're talking about trying to buy a fighter jet or testing anti-personnel weapons to be dropped in Cuba, you ask yourself, how long does Cuba have to keep giving in?" González said.

"If planes like this were entering U.S. airspace, they wouldn't be allowed in twice. In fact, at the trial, a discussion ensued about introducing the video of the planes over Havana, the judge, before seeing the video, said: 'I don't think you could fly over Washington without consequences,'" he added.

"Also the U.S. government is partly responsible for allowing it to continue. Why didn't they stop them? Because the U.S. government has always played politics with the Cuban community in Miami. I'm talking about the counter-revolution, not about the community. The U.S. has allowed it to take the two countries almost into a confrontation," González said.

"Recently, the U.S. Justice Department filed an indictment against Raúl Castro for first-degree murder and for downing the Brothers to the Rescue planes. What's your opinion on this?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"I think this is a strictly political move. They know this has nothing to do with the U.S. justice system, nor with international law, nor with Cuban law. And they know well they have no right to do it, legally speaking. I think it's a move to strengthen Trump's position as far as invading Cuba," González said.

"It's curious, because we're talking about events separated by 30 years. The Bay of Pigs invasion [in 1961]. And then Brothers to the Rescue in 1996. And we are now talking about this indictment. It's like history repeats itself every 30 years," he continued.

"In that period of time the conditions arose to toughen their position against Cuba and achieve the invasion that didn't happen 60 years ago. And what's happening now is the same. When you compare what happened in the 1990s and what's happening now, we're going through a difficult period, almost all alone. The country's economy is in serious trouble," González said.

"The purpose of the [1960] Mallory memorandum was for Cubans to despair and turn against the government. Starve them, suffocate them. They see that goal within reach again with the situation right now. A situation they themselves created," he said.

"And on top of that, history provides them with a president who is an irrational and thoughtless guy who can do anything and Miami never misses an opportunity to turn the president against Cuba," González added.

"Miami is a case where the tail has always wanted to wag the dog and there are times when they have succeeded," he said.

"The federal offices in Miami have always served as an instrument, because of their proximity to the Cuban counter-revolution, and they've always worked for the counter-revolution, turning Washington against Cuba," González continued.

"And this is one of those occasions. When you look at the U.S. Attorney in Miami, he's a Cuban American close to Trump, whom Trump put there probably as a political strategy to score points with the Cubans in Miami," he said.

"And the man does not miss an opportunity to turn Trump against Cuba," González added.

"It's a formula that has many variables. I think that introducing the variable of prosecution against Raul, after the historical precedent of Maduro, and Khamenei in Iran, is an attempt to tip the balance toward aggression and the invasion they have always wanted," he concluded.

"Could you compare the current charges against Raúl with your own trial?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"What the two cases have in common is that they're both parodies. In both cases, the prosecution politicized everything about the shoot-down," González said.

"I always said: If the prosecutors had accused us of what we were, that we were unregistered foreign agents, there probably wouldn't have been a trial because it wouldn't have made sense to defend against something you actually are guilty of. Most likely we would have pled guilty. We would have done three or four years and returned to Cuba," he continued.

"But the prosecutors were determined to politicize the case and seven months after our arrests, they introduced the matter of Brothers to the Rescue against Gerardo [Hernández]," González said.

"And that's where the whole story got complicated. I even think they lost control of the trial because they made a mistake. Regardless of the verdict, they made a mistake because the charge was completely false. And I think the same thing is happening now. The charge against Raúl is just as politically motivated as the one against Gerardo," he said.

"In fact, I would venture to say that at that time they wanted to use Gerardo against Raúl, to get him to testify in exchange for a reduced sentence. Gerardo didn't do that. They've waited until now to bring this accusation against Raúl. But first, they have no jurisdiction," González said.

"They have no jurisdiction over anything that happened in Cuba, which was an act of state. Raúl was the head of an army carrying out state orders. We're talking about sovereign state immunity," he continued.

"Anyone can accuse Trump of doing the same with the boats that he's been sinking in the Caribbean and the Pacific Ocean. And those are truly in international waters. So I think that legally speaking, the case is weak," González said.

"I read the indictment. The indictment is pure politics. It seems to have been written by a relative of Batista. The term 'Castro's regime' appears 70 times. The indictment is a mess, meant to overwhelm the jury with politics. And legally, it's a bunch of facts, which even includes us, to somehow prove Raúl's guilt," he added.

"Your name appears in the new indictment?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"Yes, those of us in the original trial, appear in the indictment. We appear in the indictment, but in such an extensive way, it seems that the indictment was made to fail," González said.

"During your time as an agent, before your arrest, did you ever feel guilty for lying to those people? Did you ever empathize with anyone?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"Yes, I empathized with a lot of them. Not all the people who are in those activities are bad people. There are people who simply have their own political views, but do not necessarily act with the malice, or premeditation that others do," González said.

"There were people who were dragged by leaders, who used them for their own purposes. You can't forget that those who organized these activities used language to appeal to their feelings. I never felt that what I did meant I had a personal problem with anyone," he continued.

"I still get along with some of them. They thought well of me. I like them, they also like me. I don't consider them enemies. Maybe adversaries, because we're on opposite sides. If you ask me now if I hate someone, I'd say no. I didn't let myself have those feelings," González said.

"My mission wasn't against the people, it was against what they were doing. And against the damage that they could do to Cuba," he added.

"Not only against Cuba. You also informed the U.S. government and the FBI about plans that were being developed that could have harmed the civilian population in the United States," Oliva Fernández said.

"We dismantled two groups. The Democratic National Unity Party, which was a mix of retired CIA agents. There was one of the Watergate people, Frank Sturgis, an old CIA agent who was involved in many CIA plots against Cuba in the 1960s," González said.

"There was also a group that engaged in drug trafficking. The man who ran the group was actually a drug trafficker. He proposed that I take part in a drug trafficking operation in Puerto Rico and we passed the information to the FBI. We also passed the information to the DEA and these two groups were dismantled thanks to that information," he continued.

"You served your 15-year sentence, but the rest of your comrades came home as part of the U.S.-Cuba normalization process. How did it feel to see that suddenly the U.S. and Cuba were trying to have a normal relationship?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"I think it was a positive experience for everyone," González said.

"I believe that the nature of U.S. imperialism will never change as long as it exists. And the U.S. government will always defend the same interests. But it makes us a little better if amid our differences we're civil and respect each other," he added.

"I think what happened during the Obama years, regardless of the intentions behind it, showed how countries with different systems of government should relate to each other. Respect one another, compete peacefully and let history have the final say. I believe that war and confrontation, are dehumanizing and irrational, and leads only to destruction and catastrophe," González said.

"Could you compare the Cuba in which you lived when you became an intelligence officer with the Cuba we are living in now?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"When you deal with today's young people, you realize the difference between those two Cubas. We live in a Cuba where, first our parents and then we achieved dreams that for our parents seemed impossible," González said.

"And in a very short time, we managed to do things that had not been done in the country for years. I think that gave my generation and our parents a conviction, a faith, which was strongly supported by reality," he continued.

"And then, when we looked forward to the future, we saw the future as an achievable utopia. For those who were born later, many of these achievements have been eroded, and we need to understand that," González said.

"That's why it's so important to talk to young people, explain to them and involve them, because you have to put yourself in the shoes of young people who were born with everything we had. We must also think about this," he added.

"What were achievements for you are rights for me," Oliva Fernández said.

"That's how it should be. Exactly. And the youth demand more. Rightfully so," González said.

"And they're demanding a Cuba that is far from what we were able to build. Possibly part of what keeps us going is seeing what we were able to achieve. But on the other hand, what needs to be done now cannot be done with the methods that were used in our time," he continued.

"I think we have to keep looking for ways that will allow us to build the Cuba we need and that we aspire to. We have to be more pluralistic, listen a little more to each other. Sometimes we only talk to people who think like us, and we don't listen to those who don't. I think that's a mistake," González said.

"When we were talking about your process of becoming an agent, something you said resonated in me: having different opinions from Cuba's political organizations didn't necessarily mean breaking with the Revolutionary process. What do you think that looks like now, when many young people tend to distance themselves a lot from the government's discourse?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"It has to be a natural process. I think that Cuba's future will be defined by the youth. What remains for us is to give our opinion, to advise, to talk," González said.

"But they'll build the future. Obviously, among Cuban youth there is a richness of nuances that didn't exist in our time, because there was a stronger consensus around a single idea. It's not like that today. Now there are many nuances," he continued.

"And it will be the competition between those nuances that will define Cuba's future. Which is how it should be. Young people will have to agree among themselves, search, and hopefully find the best formula for those nuances to integrate so as to build a better country," González said.

"Do you think today's youth have a similar spirit of sacrifice, without comparing it to yours and what you sacrificed for Cuba?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"Maybe. Look, Maceo didn't go to a Party school nor was he a militant. When history needed him, Maceo appeared. Many of the young people who today criticize and have their opinions, with which one may or may not disagree, no one knows how they'll react if history calls for it. A Maceo will always appear," González said.

"Do you regret sacrificing your life, your family, 16 years in prison for the Cuban cause? Do you think it was worth it?" Oliva Fernández asked.

"Yes. I don't regret anything," González said.

"When I made the decision to say yes, I knew why. I will never regret choosing work over capital, and choosing Cuba over the United States," he concluded.