Cuban Isle Gifted by Fidel Castro to East Germany Fades into Obscurity

On August 18, 1972, a unique event unfolded in the diplomatic relations between Cuba and the German Democratic Republic (East Germany). The state-run news program Aktuelle Kamera broadcast a ceremony that was groundbreaking: the transfer of sovereignty over a Caribbean islet that Fidel Castro had gifted to East Germany. This was Cayo Blanco del Sur, a 7-square-kilometer island in the Gulf of Cazones, which was renamed Cayo Ernesto Thaelmann, or Ernst-Thälmann-Insel in German, in honor of the prominent German communist politician, Ernst Thälmann.

The Origins of an Unusual Gift

This intriguing episode began during Fidel Castro's official visit to Berlin in June 1972 at the invitation of Erich Honecker, then the General Secretary of East Germany's Socialist Unity Party. During this meeting, Honecker presented Castro with a teddy bear, a symbol of Berlin. In return, Fidel offered a far grander gesture: he gifted an entire Cuban island to East Germany.

Reports from that time describe how, during a meeting at the Council of State building in Havana, Castro unfurled a map of Cuba and pointed to a small islet within the Cayos Blancos del Sur archipelago. During the announcement, he explained that the island had been a witness to the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, and it was presented as a symbolic gift "in memory of an exemplary son of the German people," referring to Ernst Thälmann. Additionally, he declared that the main beach of the islet would be named "Playa República Democrática Alemana."

The Transfer Ceremony and Ambitious Plans

The official sovereignty transfer ceremony was televised on Aktuelle Kamera on August 18, 1972. The footage showed the unveiling of an Ernst Thälmann bust on the island, with the German ambassador, several East German delegates, and numerous Cuban representatives in attendance. This act solidified the symbolic bond between the two socialist nations.

The principal aim behind the gift was ambitious: to transform the islet into a "communist tourist destination" for the citizens of East Germany. Ideally, Cayo Ernesto Thaelmann would become a Caribbean paradise reserved for East German workers, blending socialist ideals with pristine beaches, coral reefs, and a tropical setting. Following this journey, Fidel Castro returned to Cuba with a signed agreement granting 6% of Cuba's white sugar exports to East Germany.

Challenges and Abandonment

However, the vision of a communist tourist haven, like many of Fidel Castro's initiatives, never came to fruition. Economic and logistical constraints faced by East Germany, coupled with the travel limitations of its citizens, thwarted any development attempts on the island. Despite being symbolically German territory, East Germans were never permitted to vacation there.

Distance and travel restrictions, which even prevented many citizens from visiting nearby countries like Hungary, made a trip to the Caribbean unthinkable. Over time, the island fell into oblivion. Its coral reefs and endangered species remained untouched, while the Ernst Thälmann bust, a solitary reminder of the gesture, was destroyed by Hurricane Mitch in 1998.

Germany's Reunification and the Island's Fate

With the fall of the Berlin Wall and Germany's reunification in 1990, Cayo Ernesto Thaelmann's fate was left uncertain. In 2001, a reader of the magazine "Thema 1" discovered a press clipping in his late mother's jewelry box. Moved by her unrealized wish to someday visit "the East German island in Cuba," he sent the clipping to the magazine's editor, Marcel Henninger, who initiated a territorial claim, later pursued by the newspaper TAZ.

Nonetheless, the German Foreign Ministry clarified that "the name change and map signature in 1972 were merely symbolic acts without any connection to ownership, so Germany did not consider any claims." Yet, some were not deterred. Matthias Kästner, a banker from Pirmasens, and his friend Marcel Wiesinger founded the "Ernst Thälmann Island Initiative," soliciting contributions of at least 50 marks in exchange for a share of the island once they had raised enough to purchase it.

"If the price is right, anything is possible," was their slogan, estimating that they could negotiate ownership for roughly 30 million marks, equivalent to about 15 million euros today. If unsuccessful, they planned to donate the funds "to the street children" of Cuba. The project failed to attract investors, and the island faded from memory once more.

The Legacy of a Symbolic Gesture

Today, the island is part of a military exclusion zone and is off-limits to visitors. Some nostalgic German tourists bribe Cuban fishermen to reach it illegally. Cayo Ernesto Thaelmann remains uninhabited and largely forgotten, occasionally mentioned in historical accounts and anecdotes about Cuba-East Germany relations, though its significance is mostly anecdotal.

The island's biodiversity, including black coral reefs and ornamental fish, remains one of its greatest treasures. However, traces of its political past, like the Thälmann bust, lie buried in the sand. In recent years, the islet's story has inspired curiosities, such as a claim by a micronation called the Republic of Molossia, asserting that the island is East Germany's last remnant and maintaining a "symbolic war" with this former regime.

Despite these unusual twists, Cayo Ernesto Thaelmann stands as a testament to the political surrealism of the Cold War, where symbolic and propagandistic gestures between socialist countries led to stories as peculiar as that of a "German" Cuban island in the Caribbean.