IT is not worthy of a great nation, that in order to get its way it will seek to threaten and intimidate a small people who in no way have the means to resist. Those were the sentiments that ran through my mind when I heard the most recent comments of United Sates Consul General Denis Coleman on Bermuda's ties to Cuba.

I also thought that in terms of US diplomatic representatives in Bermuda, I can never recall an American Consul General who appears to have been so ideologically driven or so willing to intervene in Bermudian affairs to put across his country's point of view.

I accept that under the current White House administration led by President Bush, the Americans maintain a very hostile foreign policy with regards to Cuba. However, being an open society it is clear, for those of us astute enough to recognise it, that America's overall Cuban policy is as full of holes as that of Swiss cheese.

On the one hand we hear the big-stick policies as enunciated by Mr. Coleman but on the other, one is aware that it was not too long ago legislators from both the Democratic and Republican parties attempted to soften America's stance towards the Communist island.

The Consul General's analogy of drawing of water from a well may be his way of describing Bermuda's relations with the United States ? but these relations have never been as one-sided as he implied.

Bermuda has never sought foreign aid from America, unlike many other countries whose populations far exceed our own. We provided America with gun powder during its struggle for Independence from Britain. Perhaps the argument can be made that this British colony collaborated with the American revolutionaries because we had no choice, for it was in exchange for the US Navy not embargoing ? and starving ? Bermuda.

But to me the Gunpowder Plot marked the beginning of a long, largely friendly relationship between our two countries. Indeed, during the Cold War Bermuda served as a tripwire for the defence of the east coast of the United States against Soviet submarines carrying ballistic missiles, a pivotal strategic role that was never questioned in any significant way let alone challenged by Bermudians.

The Consul General's fears that Bermuda will be used by American citizens who want to get around their country's boycott of Cuba reminds me of the argument used about America's war on drugs. America has aided the governments of those countries where the drugs are produced ? and this has often meant military aid and the spraying of crops in the lands where such drugs are grown.

But it has also meant the poisoning of those same lands, meaning not even legitimate cash crops will grow. America seems reluctant to accept the argument that a real war on drugs should begin at home ? that it is far better to cut off the market for drugs in America itself, than to arm right-wing governments and poison lands.

I bring this up because I do not see America as a monolithic entity. I cannot believe that America, as diverse as it is, would willingly agree that Bermuda should be punished and made to suffer over its relationship with Cuba ? especially when we look at the irony that the Spanish airline which supposedly helps Americans elude their country's boycott of Cuba is from a country that has been one of its staunch allies in its War on Terror.

I have heard Bermudian politicians make the argument that America feeds us. And I have made a counter-argument that we pay for what we import from America. We as a country earn those dollars which are pushed right back into the American economy.

may be a meagre sum when we consider America's overall trade relations with the rest of the world. But I place value on what I earn as a worker even if it is recycled American dollars which allows me not only to buy goods and services from America, but from the world based on the fact that the American dollar is the leading international currency.

But surely this relationship does not require me to bow down at the feet of America. I have not heard any American demand that this should be so.

We live in a world where we are supposed to have free moral agency, although I am well aware that many do not enjoy this fundamental human right. But it is the central theme of American democracy. I am aware that this lack of freedom as the US sees it is the core issue in its relationship with Cuba, which in America's eyes does not represent a free society.

But in the past America has entered into with countries which have been administered every bit as brutally as Cuba. The former Soviet Union, China and now even Libya, still a one-party state and once even considered to be a rogue state, enjoy near normal relations with the United States.

The question is why not Cuba, which is a mere 90 miles off America's shore? The answer, of course, is the divide among the Cuban people which started with Fidel Castro's Cuban Revolution.

Those who agreed with it and supported Castro stayed at home; those who disagreed have relocated to Florida (indeed, Miami now boasts the second largest Cuban population outside of Havana).

There is still a push and pull between these two communities which has drawn America into the Cuban imbroglio and which has prevented a between Washington and Havana.

If there was no Cuban exile community in Florida, then perhaps there would have long ago been d?tente between America and Cuba.

Certainly this divide among the Cuban people has added an intensity to Cuban/American relations, which is further compounded because the Cuban community in America are now American citizens ? and therefore are now a political constituency whose interests cannot be ignored.

is an irony of course because the whole idea of America was to create a new society, not one that was dominated by the old conflicts its people fled to escape.

This long-running conflict has the power to draw others into it as Bermuda is now finding out. Should we be made to pay a price because we have a with Cuba in line with those pursued by the rest of the world except America?