A new course for Cuba

This year is shaping up to be difficult for the Cuban people. Faced with a recent US-orchestrated oil blockade of the island, Cuban leadership now confronts a worsening energy crisis and an increasingly irate public. Worse yet, the Trump administration has intimated that Cuba may be America’s next target. In a year that has already seen the fall of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khameini, Cuban leadership has considerable cause for concern. In other words, if the Trump administration is openly attempting full-scale regime change on the other side of the world, little would seem to deter them when the target is only 90 miles away.

However, there is good cause not to act on the temptation. Even if this year’s regime change attempts are generously deemed successes — assuming one calls the Venezuelan regime “changed” and the ongoing Iran War a “success” — enthusiasm for additional regime change attempts is misplaced, especially while the long-term effects of these operations remain unknown. Moreover, current efforts toward pressuring Cuba are less likely to cause regime change than they are to cause a humanitarian crisis on the island. Given that the threat posed by President Miguel Diaz-Canel’s rule is negligible to the United States, American policymakers would be wise to alter course.

Historically, American attempts at regime change have been remarkably unsuccessful. Efforts like the Bay of Pigs Invasion and Operation Mongoose proved insufficient to dislodge the Castro regime from power. Worse yet, the former operation cultivated one of the more embarrassing incidents of the entire Cold War. Having explored the futility of Cuban regime change in the early 1960s, American policymakers have since held in place an embargo of the Cuban economy. Despite a brief reprieve during the Obama presidency, this embargo has largely been held in place with the purpose of crippling the Cuban economy and destabilizing the Cuban government.

This embargo, combined with the suspension of Cuba from the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (Rio Treaty) has served to isolate Cuba from the global economy and American-led regional institutions. These measures, intended as discipline, have proven to be merely punitive in the face of poor results.

Through it all, regime change has not materialised in Havana, and there exists little evidence that it will today.

The convenience of the regime change prospect is also its hazard. Given Cuba’s close proximity to the United States, any humanitarian crisis of scale in Cuba would quickly arrive on American shores. Any blowback from an attempt to topple Diaz-Canel could arrive with relative haste in the form of retaliatory attacks against the US by nonstate actors. To that point, American intervention in Latin America’s internal affairs is typically met with resentment and condemnation, even from allies and partners.

Successfully or unsuccessfully, a brazen attempt by the United States to appoint her neighbor’s leaders is likely to foment backlash in her own backyard. Historically, American intervention in the internal affairs of Latin America has gone unappreciated, and regime change in Cuba would largely add fuel to anti-American narratives.

Fortunately, however, the current moment does offer alternatives. As stated earlier, the Cuban economy is experiencing considerable energy problems at present, and the general population is taking notice. Diaz-Canel has made clear his willingness to negotiate with the Trump administration in exchange for relief, albeit not on terms that threaten Cuban sovereignty. Accordingly, in order for negotiations to be productive, the Trump administration should forfeit its ambitions for a non-communist Cuba. Under the following terms, the United States could settle the issue of Cuban subversion at no cost to its reputation, servicemen, or treasury.

In the present crisis, the United States should, first and foremost, seek to reduce the already minimal military threat posed by Cuba. Given that Cuba presents a negligible military threat to the US, the primary threat involves Cuban invitation of foreign powers into America’s backyard. Accordingly, the US should seek to end Cuban cooperation with rival powers. This would not entail Cuba’s readmission into the Rio Treaty at this juncture, per se, but rather simply that Russian and Chinese forces would no longer be hosted on the island. This measure would remove Cuba as a military foothold of America’s rivals, while leaving open the long-term possibility of Cuban readmission to the Rio Treaty.

In the medium-term, it would be prudent for the United States to pursue Cuban reentry into the Organization of American States. Cuban participation in the Organization would demonstrate that the United States — and the OAS by extension — is capable of respecting the right of Latin American nations to self-determination. This measure would effectively counter criticism from other member states regarding Cuba’s exclusion, and thereby help re-legitimize the institution. In exchange for the above, Cuban leadership should be relieved from American measures designed to destabilize the Cuban economy and regime. This is to say that American leaders should guarantee that the United States would not engage in activities intended to overthrow the Cuban government, or foment radical discontent in Cuba. Combined with full sanctions relief and Cuban reentry into the OAS, this measure would signal America’s willingness to reintegrate Cuba into the global economy despite its present economic system.

American policy toward Cuba has so far been a case study not in discipline, but insanity. Our repeated efforts toward subversion on the island have fomented misery for its people and a growing opportunity cost to the United States. In cleaving to the present strategy, we commit ourselves to a form of hegemony that is both highly predatory and unsustainable for the long-haul. In the face of growing challenges outside of our hemisphere, it has become particularly important to establish peaceful relations within it.