aggie93 said:

---

akaggie said:

---

halfastros81 said:

---

I think Iran is next but it's just a matter of time for the Cuban regime as well.

---

Sadly, we've been waiting for the current Cuban regime to fail for over 60 years. The leadership in Cuba isn't suffering. They will need to be forced out with help from outside of Cuba.

---

The problem is every time we have had Cuba or Iran on the ropes we get a Dem in and they breathe life into them. Obama and Biden both brought them back from the brink.

---

I don't see the embargo as a partisan issue anymore. If it was going to work, it would have worked decades ago. The only people living on the brink now are the Cuban people. Cuban government officials are still living nicely.

Aston04 said:

---

Rubio is literally talking about the possibility of invading Cuba..... And NBC host is saying... alright.. alright... hurrying him to a commercial break.

---

She dealt with him in exactly the same manner I deal with my dad when he is talking politics... a bit dismissive of a huge bit of information coming out of the mouth of the US SOS.

ttu_85 said:

---

Aston04 said:

---

Rubio is literally talking about the possibility of invading Cuba..... And NBC host is saying... alright.. alright... hurrying him to a commercial break.

---

No need to invade, a precise decapitation strike would do the job just fine as it did in VZ

---

Cuba's plight is extremely complicated. On one hand, it would be easy to eliminate Diaz-Canel, but there is no one to fill the void once he is gone. No viable freedom movement, or even an alternative party, exists inside the country. I wish that wasn't the case because it would make things so much easier.

However, as it stands, there simply isn't a mechanism in place to govern Cuba from the inside if there is a precise strike against high-ranking government officials. Someone would have to step in and manage the chaos. From a sheer logistics perspective, that would likely need to be the United States or an organization within the United States.

The chaos would also need to be managed on BOTH sides of the Florida Straits b/c there will be an influx of Cuban Americans rushing back to Cuba. (Most Cuban Americans don't see themselves as refugees...they see themselves as exiles.) Historically, the Cuban people (and actually most of Latin America) are VERY sensitive to U.S. involvement in their affairs. In Cuba, that sensitivity goes back to the late 1800s.

akaggie said:

---

ttu_85 said:

---

Aston04 said:

---

Rubio is literally talking about the possibility of invading Cuba..... And NBC host is saying... alright.. alright... hurrying him to a commercial break.

---

No need to invade, a precise decapitation strike would do the job just fine as it did in VZ

---

Cuba's plight is extremely complicated. On one hand, it would be easy to eliminate Diaz-Canel, but there is no one to fill the void once he is gone. No viable freedom movement, or even an alternative party, exists inside the country. I wish that wasn't the case because it would make things so much easier.

However, as it stands, there simply isn't a mechanism in place to govern Cuba from the inside if there is a precise strike against high-ranking government officials. Someone would have to step in and manage the chaos. From a sheer logistics perspective, that would likely need to be the United States or an organization within the United States.

The chaos would also need to be managed on BOTH sides of the Florida Straits b/c there will be an influx of Cuban Americans rushing back to Cuba. (Most Cuban Americans don't see themselves as refugees...they see themselves as exiles.) Historically, the Cuban people (and actually most of Latin America) are VERY sensitive to U.S. involvement in their affairs. In Cuba, that sensitivity goes back to the late 1800s.

---

Rubio can multi-task like a m'fer. Give it to him.

YouBet said:

---

Rubio can multi-task like a m'fer. Give it to him.

---

Or put an abuela from Miami in charge...Cuban abuelas are a force to be reckoned with!

Good post. What would you like to see happen, and when? What should the US Gov't be doing to help the right folks?

Bay of Pigs was a long time ago, it seems like a better operation could be executed today, but I don't know about the aftermath.

rocky the dog said:

---

---

Chingao, Rocky! Lol

Demosthenes81 said:

---

No Spin Ag said:

---

Someone please tell me there's oil to be gotten in Cuba so we can drive gas prices even lower.

---

Even better, 1940s and 50s cars, OEM baby!

---

Dibs on the '53 'Vette

nortex97 said:

---

Good post. What would you like to see happen, and when? What should the US Gov't be doing to help the right folks?

Bay of Pigs was a long time ago, it seems like a better operation could be executed today, but I don't know about the aftermath.

---

I would love to see the Cuban people somehow be equipped to chart their own course and determine their own destiny. I have no earthly idea how that is even possible without the United States at this point. If someone claims to have an easy fix, they definitely don't understand the complexity of the situation.

Complexity #1: Cuba doesn't have a lot of friends left. Maduro is gone. Russia is focused on Ukraine. Cuba has struggled for decades to service the debts they owe to China. (There have even been reports that China has taken Cuba to court in Europe over unpaid debt.) Mexico has been helping...but is that enough to sustain them? And will it even continue?

Complexity #2: Given the state of the infrastructure (power, water, healthcare, trash, craters in the streets, buildings falling down, EVERYTHING), it is going to take A LOT of money to put Cuba back together again. There are only a few countries in the world with the resources to pull that off. I think it is a pretty safe bet the United States does NOT want at least two of those countries setting up shop 90 miles from Florida.

Complexity #3: The U.S. embargo has been in place longer than I've been alive. I fully believe it is a failed policy at this point. 60 years and nothing has changed. All it does is give the Cuban government another excuse to blame their woes on the United States. The embargo only hurts the Cuban people. Government officials aren't suffering one bit. If the embargo and other restrictions were lifted, it would at least provide an opportunity for people in the United States to help the Cuban people.

Complexity #4: Cuba is facing an ever-deepening humanitarian crisis at this point. People are suffering and people are dying. There are three mosquito-borne viruses ravaging the country. No medicine. No mosquito spray. People dig through trash looking for food. People are dying on the street.

Complexity #5: There is a learned helplessness that has been conditioned by decades of fear. They do what they are told, and they do not question or disobey...even when it is beyond ridiculous. (I have a great example regarding a make-believe "cyclone" that I experienced first-hand, but it is too long to type this late at night!) Bottom line, this mindset makes it nearly impossible for them feel like they might be able to change their destiny.

I definitely agree about the Bay of Pigs fiasco and yes, I don't think we'd encounter many difficulties getting into Cuba...it is the "what now?" that will be the biggest problem if that ever happens.

(My father was actually recruited to participate in the Bay of Pigs and never quite let go of his hatred for Kennedy. Cubans can definitely hold a grudge!)

Thx, again good info. I agree, it would be complex. Hotair.com Ed Morissey piece on the WSJ/Wapo analyses of Cuba regime as the biggest loser with Maduro ouster. Some of the challenge of course is the massive security apparatus they have long maintained (can they keep up with the payments though?):

Quote:

---

The Washington Post details those challenges in its own report today, tacitly agreeing with the WSJ's assessment of Cuba being the biggest loser in this operation:

Quote:

---

Aside from an economic uptick during the Obama administration, when the resumption of diplomatic relations between Washington and Havana led to increased tourism and slender openings for private ownership and outside investment, the Cuban economy has never really recovered from the Soviet fall.
The nation has been on a steady slide into economic chaos for years, owing to U.S. sanctions and what even many of its supporters see as mismanagement by a sclerotic Cuban Communist Party.
Some chose to see opportunity in the darkness following Maduro's ouster. Carlos Alzugaray, a retired career Cuban diplomat reached by phone at his Havana home, said, "There is of course an increase of the threat, a very bad thing."
But it was possible, he said, that Cuba's allies in Russia and elsewhere would help, "and just maybe the government will … open up the economy and do what the economists have been telling them for a long time and they have refused to do."

---

Russia is not in a position to help anyone at the moment. Vladimir Putin has set Russia's reserves on fire to fund his war in Ukraine, and he relied on the black-market oil revenues facilitated by the same network Maduro used to backstop the Russian economy. Havana might have some luck with China, but cash alone won't solve this crisis now. The humiliation of the Maduro operation has opened another vulnerability for the regime, as the WSJ notes:

Quote:

---

For a tiny and impoverished island of about 10 million people, Cuba's security and intelligence structure is enormouswith about 100,000 officers, said Garca, the former Cuban intelligence agent.
"They have a presence in workplaces, schools, movie theaters and informants on every street block," he said. "Fidel Castro's security detail had 10,000 officers and its own counterintelligence unit."

---

---

nortex97 said:

---

Thx, again good info. I agree, it would be complex. Hotair.com Ed Morissey piece on the WSJ/Wapo analyses of Cuba regime as the biggest loser with Maduro ouster. Some of the challenge of course is the massive security apparatus they have long maintained (can they keep up with the payments though?):

---

Cuba runs out of oil: Six GAESA ships concentrate the last reserves in the bay of Matanzas

Scheinbaum over in Mexico needs to be real careful with what fights she wants to pick now. From the link:

Quote:

---

At the moment, only one foreign tanker is en route to Cuba: the Ocean Mariner, coming from Mexico, which is expected to arrive in Havana on January 8. The last shipment of Russian crude, aboard the Jasper, was unloaded in Matanzas on December 23 before heading to Santiago de Cuba.

The military intervention by the United States in Venezuela, which resulted in the capture of Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, left the Cuban regime without its main supplier.

For years, Caracas sent the island between 27,000 and 35,000 barrels of oil daily in exchange for medical, teaching, and intelligence services. Without those shipments, Havana faces an imminent energy collapse.

According to researcher Jorge Piñn from the Energy Institute at the University of Texas, if Cuba had to acquire all of its oil consumption on the international market, the annual bill would exceed $3 billion. Additionally, the low quality of the available fuel would drive up prices and particularly impact diesel and fuel oil.

"The Cuban economy is exhausted, without credit and without allies," warned Bloomberg economist Emilio Morales, president of Havana Consulting Group. "The regime is draining its own tanks to buy time, but the crisis is already structural. The collapse seems to be just weeks away."

---

"Daily struggle."