BY ELAINE DE VALLE

  José Basulto, founder of Brothers to the Rescue, celebrated a small victory last week when he won a default judgment against Fidel Castro and the Cuban government in a suit filed over the 1996 shoot-down of two Brothers planes by Cuban MiGs.

  The lawsuit never went to trial. Basulto won because neither Castro nor his legal representative responded to the legal action.

  Basulto's blue Cessna was the only one of three planes to return to the Opa-locka Airport Feb. 24, 1996, after Cuban warplanes shot down two other aircraft belonging to the search-and-rescue organization.

  Four men -- Armando Alejandre Jr., Carlos Costa, Mario de la Peña and Pablo Morales -- were killed in the attack.

  Basulto plans to seek more than $40 million in damages at a hearing to be scheduled before U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra in Fort Lauderdale, said Larry Klayman, chairman of Judicial Watch, which filed the lawsuit on Basulto's behalf.

  ''We will hold Cuba accountable because no one, whether it's the Clinton administration or the Bush administration, is doing that sufficiently,'' Klayman said.

  A federal clerk entered the judgment Jan. 17 in U.S. District Court after the deadline passed for Cuba's response.

  Basulto said Thursday that he would give any money he receives from the lawsuit to dissidents in Cuba, as well as to help finance a case in Belgium that seeks to indict Castro of crimes against humanity.

  Any payment would come from frozen Cuban government assets in U.S. banks. However, even if he wins, it could be years before Basulto collects any money. The families of three of the slain fliers won $188 million in damages in 1997 but did not get the money until 2001.

  Representatives of the Cuban government at the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, D.C., could not be reached for comment. Island officials have said in the past that U.S. courts have no jurisdiction.

  Material from The Associated Press supplemented this report.