Even though Cuban President Fidel Castro appears to be recovering from intestinal surgery, his illness has forced the Cuban people to face the fact of his mortality. While the strongman's younger brother, Defense Minister Raul Castro, has assumed power in his absence, there is little likelihood of a dynasty ruling the island 150 km off the Florida coast. Key to Cuba's future is its relations with the United States. A light diplomatic touch is required: A heavy-handed attempt by Washington to intervene in Cuban politics could very well strengthen the Communist Party bureaucracy that the world would like to see weakened.

President Castro has ruled Cuba with an iron fist since he seized power in 1959. He has tolerated no dissent, either within his party or from the outside. His brother has been at his side since the revolution first began with the attack on a military facility in 1953. Today he is the minister of defense and the president's constitutionally designated successor.

President Castro is a canny survivor. He has fended off Cuba's huge neighbor to the north for more than four decades, defeating invasion attempts and dodging assassination plots. He has used U.S. opposition to consolidate his rule, standing firmly atop Cuban nationalism (along with support from other opponents of the U.S., such as the former Soviet Union) as a prop. Indeed, he delights in tweaking Washington. When the U.S. demanded greater freedom for the citizens of Cuba in 1980, he responded by emptying the country's prisons and mental asylums, and sending tens of thousands of them to the U.S. in what is known today as the Mariel boatlift. Washington's fear of another exercise in freedom -- or the creation of instability that might produce another mass exodus -- has tempered its zeal for meddling in Cuban politics.