Captain America (vol. 4) #25
Homeland: Part 5
Captain America had been asked to be part of the jury for the Fernand Hedayat treason trial which was being held at an off-shore military prison. Upon arriving, a group of terrorists broke out of the prison and took Hedayat with them and fled into Cuba to find some bio-weapons left there for them. Captain America was then forced to work with two Cuban soldiers, Luisa Prohias and Arturo to recover the escapees and the weapon.
Now, the terrorists are all dead, Fernand has been shot, and the Cubans want to take the bio-weapon for themselves. Prepared for just such a contingency, Captain America activates a SHIELD device that will bombard the area with microwaves in less than 8 mintues, rendering the bio-weapons useless. He tells the Cubans that they need to leave in that time or else they’ll be fried with everything else in the blast radius.
Luisa, however, refuses to leave empty handed and is willing to shoot Captain America to secure the weapons. Her partner, Arturo, however is a very spiritual man who believes that Cap’s arrival was foretold to him in a dream. He tells her to look out behind her, but there is no threats to be seen. This creates enough of a distraction for Cap to toss his shield through the engine block of the truck carrying the weapons, making it impossible for them to be removed. With five minutes left and no way to remove the bio-weapons, Luisa gives up and they all flee from the scene. Moments later, the area is bombarded with microwaves, killing the biological agents in the weapon. Captain America then reports back his success to Nick Fury, but needs a medevac right away to treat Fernand Hedayat’s gunshot wound.
Soon, Fernand is given the best care possible at Cuba’s Hospital de Commandant Manuel Fajardo. Cap is visited there by US Senator Lester Pauly, who is defending Fernand in court who is updated on the situation. They are also joined by the Cuban President who schmoozes with them as the Cuban army did recover the bio-weapons. Luisa and Arturo have kept quiet the fact that they have been rendered useless leaving the Cuban leader to think he now has access to a powerful weapon. After the President leaves, Cap assures Paley that there is nothing to worry about.
When Fernand wakes up, Cap and the Senator go in to see how he is doing. He confirms that the reason that he was part of the jail break because El-Gamal knew he spoke Spanish and forced him to come along. He thanks Captain America for saving his life and tells them that he has refused an offer from the President to become a resident of Cuba. Despite the fact that he has been treated as an enemy of his own country, Hedayat intends to return to American custody and stand trial because he is certain that he can win his case. He reminds Captain America that he is American and he a Republican and will fight to get his citizenship back so he can return home. As Cap and Paley leave the hospital, Lester figures there might be some push back from the Cubans because of Ferenand’s refusal to stay, but a call to the State Department should have everything sorted out by the time Hedayat is ready to be released from the hospital. That’s when Cap gets a call ordering him back to the military prison for a debriefing ASAP.
A few hours later, Captain America is back at the American base to fill in Generals Lincoln Barron and Tony MacPherson on what happened. Given the fact that Hedayat was an unwilling participant in the breakout and his willingness to return and stand trial, they are going to have his trail bumped down to a Federal Court. Meanwhile, the prison’s commanding office, Colonel Boyd, has resigned from his post after it was revealed that he chipped the prisoners with GPS trackers without telling anybody.[1] MacPherson has now been put in charge and he promises to operate the prison more humanely and with better transparence than his predecessor.
With the main business out of the way, Captain America asks to speak with General Barron in private. Cap wanted to talk to him about the attack on him and two Homeland Security agents at the start of all this.[2] Forensics came back with information on the firearms used. While the machine guns had the serial numbers filed off, the type of weapon and munitions used were all military grade. Cap has deduced that the shooting was a textbook military black bag operation of the type that Barron used to oversee. Barron doesn’t outright admit it, but he tells Steve that sometimes his left hand does something different from his right hand. As a soldier, he has no choice but to follow orders and doesn’t have the luxury of Cap’s no-killing policy. However, he reminds Steve that soldiers don’t kill, politicians do with policy. This angers Cap and he is about to throw Barron into the ocean as he did Boyd earlier. Barron tells him that he can swim and suggests that Cap learn to do the same in the the current political environment.
When General Barron walks away, Cap asks Nick Fury got all that. As it turns out, Steve had turned on the communicator built into his cowl and the entire conversation was heard by Fury. Nick promises to pass the recording along to the Director of Homeland Security, who will want to deal with Barron for injuring and killing some of his men. When Nick asks what Steve is doing next, Fury suggests he stay in Cuba and celebrate an annual celebration as it is quite the spectacle. Steve decides to do just that, but first he puts in a call to his new girlfriend, Rebecca Quan to see if she’ll come out.[3]
Rebecca can come out and she and Steve celebrate with Luisa Prohias, Arturo Gutierrez, Lester Paley and their family members. Having a private moment with the Senator on the balcony, Steve learns about how his wife died of an aggressive form of cancer. They tried to use a new experimental treatment to try and cure her, but she ended up dying anyway. He likens her immune system to American liberties. They too can be burdened by an illness that, without the right treatment, could be incurable, as the incident of Fernand Hedayat is showing them. With that in mind, Lester has decided that he is going to be running in the next Presidential Election as a third party candidate. He wants Steve to be his running mate as Vice Presidential candidate as he shares Lester’s values. He says that this will be an important election as the future of their country is being fobbed off with extreme ideals on both side of the political spectrum. When the others cut in on the converation and learn about Pauly’s request they all think it is a good idea. However, Steve turns Lester down, as being the Vice President would prevent him from doing his job as Captain America.[4]
Talk about politics and the future are then put aside as the fireworks begin. Steve and Rebecca stand out on the balcony and watch them together.
Recurring Characters
Captain America, Lincoln Barron, Rebecca Quan, Luisa Prohias, Arturo Gutierrez, Fernand Hedayat, Lester Pauly, Tony MacPherson
Continuity Notes
It was revealed that the terrorists were all chipped in Captain America (vol. 4) #23.
Back before Steve agreed to be part of the jury he was attacked by masked gunmen in issue #21.
Steve first met Rebecca in issue #21. The two hit it off right away. The two will effectively start dating as of this issue. However, it won’t be destined to last very long. Rebecca will break up with Steve in Captain America (vol. 4) #28 because she won’t be able to handle the constant danger his life as a superhero brings to their relationship.
Old timers will remember that Captain America had previously turned down a chance to run for President as the third party candidate for the same reasons in Captain America #250.
Topical References
This story is stated as taking place in December of 2003. This date should be considered topical as it is relative to the date of publication.
The main plot point to this story is that the prisoners loose in Cuba had escaped from Guantanamo Bay military prison off the coast of Cuba. At the time this story was published in 2004 if had just recently opened to house those captured and charged with terrorism in the fallout of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. It had already gained infamy for reports of torture and prisoner abuse and the fact the prisoners were often held without trial for years on end. At it’s height, it was home to over 700 prisoners. Time of this writing (February, 2023) there are less than 40. With talks of shutting the prison down becoming more common in recent times the place will probably be closed sooner or later and as such its reference here should be considered a topical reference. Modern readers should interpret this location as an unidentified off-short prison that is unique to the fiction as opposed to a real life location.
Another plot point involves the escaped terrorists attempting to access chemical weapons hidden in Cuba. This story states that they had come from Iraq. Following 9/11, President George W. Bush justified an invasion of Iraq in 2003 under the pretense that its leader, Saddam Hussein, was creating WMDs that were then given to terrorists. The fear was that groups like al-Queda (responsible for 9/11) would get ahold of chemical or nuclear grade weapons. I’m not about to get into the intricate details, but while Iraq had a history of developing chemical weapons that were then used against their enemies, any notion that Hussein was creating WMDs for the reasons that justified such an invasion proved to be wrong. This didn’t stop the US from invading and later executing Hussein that same year. At any rate, since Hussein is now dead, the invasion is 20 years over, and the fact that no WMDs were found, this should be considered a topical reference as it was never factually accurate to begin with. Modern readers should interpret this instead as WMDs created in some unspecified region of the Middle East by an unspecified dictator. Likely in an instance unique to the fiction since the assertions were fiction themselves IRL.
The President of Cuba is depicted as Fidel Castro. This should be considered a topical reference as Castro stepped down due to health reasons in 2008 and later died in 2016.
The story ends on New Years Eve, which doesn’t affect the plot as a holiday like Christmas would. Since you could replace it with any celebration that involves fireworks. It can doubly be considered topical as the scene takes place in Cuba, a country with its own unique celebrations as well as those shared with the United States. As such, references to New Years could be considered topical.
Lester Paley specifically states that his wife died of breast cancer that spread to her brain. This should be considered a topical reference. As I write this (February, 2023), medical science is in the early stages of finding a cure for this illness. As this is a reality that is possible within our lifetime, the specifics of this illness should be considered topical. Modern readers should interpret Lester’s wife as having died of an unspecified form of cancer.
Lester states that he will be competing in the 2004 Presidential Election. This was the closest election of that kind at the time.. As this reference is relative to the date of publication, it should be considered topical.
When talking about third party politicians who have run in the past, Lester makes reference to both Ralph Nader and Ross Perot. Both men have been the most well known third party candidates in the 20th century. Nader ran for President in 1996, 2000, 2004, and 2008 (time of this writing). He has struggled to capture more than 1% of the vote. The late Ross Perot (1930-2019) fared a little better when he tried running for President as a third party candidate in 1992, winning almost 19% of the popular vote. Although Nader and Perot are still the most famous examples to date, this could change in the future. As such, this reference could eventually become topical.
George W. Bush is referred to as the present sitting President in this story. This should be considered a topical reference as Bush finished his second term in 2009.
