After the attack on Venezuela, the USA is betting on the collapse of the regime in Cuba. But that hasn’t been decided yet. Experts doubt the US strategy.
US President Donald Trump is already certain of his victory. “I strongly recommend that they make a deal BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE,” Trump wrote last Sunday on his network Truth Social, referring to the socialist regime in Cuba. He did not explain what type of deal he meant. In view of the US intervention in Cuba’s ally Venezuela and the kidnapping of the ruler Nicolás Maduro, Trump added: “THERE WILL NO MORE OIL OR MONEY FLOW TO CUBA – ZERO!”
Although he does not rule out military intervention by the USA, he is apparently counting on a collapse of the socialist government, which has been in power since 1959. Without oil from Venezuela, according to Trump’s calculations, the regime will “fall” all by itself.
In Havana, meanwhile, people are being belligerent. “Cuba is a free, independent and sovereign nation. Nobody tells us what to do,” emphasized local President Miguel Díaz-Canel. The Cubans are “ready to defend their homeland to the last drop of blood.” In fact, the regime has already weathered several crises since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the biggest supporter of the Cuban revolutionary Fidel Castro. But the air is now becoming noticeably thinner for the regime.
In an interview with “Zeit” at the beginning of January, US general and former CIA director David Petraeus said: “Cuba should rightly be very concerned.” He was referring to the fact that Venezuela would no longer be Cuba’s “source of raw materials” after the US intervention. Cuba can no longer buy oil on the world market because it lacks the financial resources. In addition, the power grid is fragile and the economy is “completely at rock bottom”. Petraeus summed up: “Cuba faces real difficulties.”
