In the early hours of Wednesday, a speedboat carrying 10 Cuban exiles drew near the coast of Cuba. It appears to have set out from Florida . It was intercepted by a patrol boat of the Cuban coastguard. There was an exchange of fire that left four people in the speedboat dead and the other six injured.
Cuba’s government announced that the exiles were planning an “infiltration with terrorist aims.” The government reports that the men were wearing camouflage and had assault rifles, explosives and ballistic vests on board.
What Cuba said about shootout involving US-registered boat
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US Secretary of State Marco Rubio declared that the United States would investigate the incident independently. He stressed that the boat’s incursion was not an official US operation, and that no government personnel were involved. Rubio told reporters that it was “highly unusual to see shootouts in open sea like that,” but added that the United States was “prepared to respond accordingly,” once it established the facts.
Marco Rubio’s role
The confrontation comes at a time of high tension between the United States and Cuba, stoked in no small measure by Rubio himself. Rubio has a personal connection with the Caribbean country, which lies less than 150 kilometers (90 miles) off the southern tip of Florida.
The secretary of state is the son of Cuban immigrants, and when he talks about the political future he wants for his parents’ homeland, he doesn’t mince his words. “I think we would like to see the regime there change,” he said at a US Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing in January. “That doesn’t mean we’re going to make a change,” Rubio said. He added, however, that it would be “a great benefit to the United States if Cuba was no longer governed by an autocratic regime.”
Rubio is regarded as the driving force behind current US policy in Latin America, including pushing for the arrest of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who was captured by US forces in January.
The US military action in Venezuela had serious repercussions for Cuba, as it cut off vital oil imports from Caracas. Washington has also threatened to impose punitive tariffs on any third country supplying the Caribbean island with oil.
The United States is putting great effort into weakening Cuba’s government. Power outages lasting several hours have become part of daily life in Cuba. The government has had to curtail school and working hours, and in many places no buses or trains are running. The United Nations has warned of a “humanitarian collapse” on the island as the acute lack of fuel and power is making it impossible to refrigerate foodstuffs, supply medicines and operate water pumps.
Cuba crisis deepens as US blockade starves island of oil
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Rubio has now announced a minimal easing of restrictions for oil exports to Cuba’s private sector. At the same time, he stressed that licences will be revoked immediately if fuel is diverted to the government or military.
The US-Cuba conflict
The United States regards Cuba as an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to national security and foreign policy. At the end of January, Trump even declared a national emergency in this regard.
In his declaration, he accused Cuba’s government of, among other things, supporting and providing a base to states and actors hostile to the United States. The statement claims that “Cuba hosts Russia’s largest overseas signals intelligence facility, which tries to steal sensitive national security information of the United States.” It also claims that Cuba is collaborating more and more closely with China. US intelligence services say they have identified at least four Chinese spy stations on the island, which they say are capable of conducting surveillance of US military operations and communications.
Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla meets his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi (right)Image: Kyodo/picture alliance
The US government has also accused Cuba of welcoming and “creating a safe environment” for international terrorist groups such as the Palestinian group Hamas and the Lebanese Hezbollah. To date, no intelligence reports or other proof have been made public to support this accusation. Nonetheless, the US has added Cuba to a list of state sponsors of international terrorism.In addition, the United States considers the propagation of communist ideology by Cuba’s government a direct threat to US interests in the region.
Cuba’s postrevolution struggle
The conflict between the United States and Cuba can be traced back to the Cuban revolution of 1959, when Fidel Castro toppled the US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista. Shortly afterward, Castro started to nationalize US businesses in Cuba.
In 1961, the US government tried to bring down Castro with the help of armed Cuban exiles. But the Bay of Pigs invasion failed, and only drove Cuba deeper into the arms of the Soviets. Fearing another US invasion, Castro allowed the USSR to station nuclear missiles on the island. This culminated in the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, when nuclear war was only narrowly averted.
The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 brought the world to the brink of nuclear warImage: AP
The far-reaching economic embargo that the US government imposed on Cuba during the missile crisis is still in place today. Diplomatic relations between the United States and Cuba remain on ice. There was the start of a tentative rapprochement under Barack Obama, but US sanctions on Cuba were tightened during the first Trump presidency, and again under Joe Biden.
Fidel Castro led Cuba for half a century; he died in 2016, but his image still dominates the islandImage: AP
Since Donald Trump’s return to office and the appointment of Marco Rubio as secretary of state, the US government has steadily upped the pressure. “If the Cuban people are suffering, it is because the regime is standing in the way of help,” Rubio said, after giving his statement about the recent shooting incident at sea. He declared that the United States would only truly ease its pressure on Cuba if the government guaranteed “political and economic freedom” to its people.
This article has been translated from German.
