Cuba’s Real Threat to the United States is a Socialised Model of Development
On 29 January, Donald Trump published an Executive Order in which he described Cuba as “an unusual and extraordinary threat” to the United States and threatened tariffs on any “foreign country that directly or indirectly sells or otherwise provides any oil to Cuba”. This has already resulted in the collapse of the national electricity grid three times in March which has prevented hospitals from maintaining emergency and intensive care services. Power outages have also impacted water sources, food security and education delivery in a country that created new benchmarks in socialised healthcare and education provision in the global South.
Cuba produces just 40 percent of its oil supply and since the abduction of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Celia Flores in January, oil imports from Venezuela, its main supplier, have stopped. Cuba had already been subjected to a US blockade since 1962 which the Cuban government estimates has cost its economy $171 billion or $20 million a day. These are huge sums for a small island economy wrestling with the rising cost of basic goods and severe restrictions imposed by the US on business, remittances and travel to the island. The Trump administration has not hidden the ultimate aim of its slow strangulation of the Cuban economy which is regime change and a return to Cuba’s pre-revolutionary status as an appendage to the US ruled by puppet administrations at Washington’s behest.
Cuba’s model of development
Trump’s threat to “take” Cuba and do “anything I want with it” speaks to an imperial arrogance without concern to the welfare or will of the Cuban people. The US oil blockade represents Cuba’s gravest crisis since the “Special Period in Time of Peace”, an extended period of austerity in the early 1990s precipitated by an 80 percent drop in trade turnover following the collapse of the former Soviet Union. Cuba survived the Special Period through the resilience and sacrifices of its people and the introduction of innovative and sustainable programmes such as organic farming and the use of biomass as an energy source. As the economist Helen Yaffe argues:
“decisions made in a period of crisis and isolation from the late 1980s shaped Cuba into the twenty-first century in the realms of development strategy, medical science, energy, ecology and the environment, and in culture and education”.
A regular misjudgement made by Cuba’s western antagonists, particularly the US, was to bracket the island with the Soviet satellites that started to collapse at the end of the Cold War in 1989. Cuba’s revolution had stronger roots built upon genuine popular participation that characterised the social programmes introduced by the revolutionary government from the early 1960s onward. In 1961, Cuba launched a literacy campaign involving educational brigades totaling 268,420 members that enabled 707,212 adults to learn to read and reduced the illiteracy rate to 3.9 per cent of the total population. This initiated one of the social platforms of the revolution; free education for all citizens at all levels with 10,626 schools currently servicing 11 million people. Women account for 60 percent of the 500,000 people employed in education and occupy leadership roles in 14 of Cuba’s 22 universities. Cuba has also developed a groundbreaking adult and youth literacy programme called Yo, sí puedo (‘Yes, I Can’) that has been rolled out in thirty countries and enabled 10.6 million people to read, with the majority of learners from the global South.
Healthcare
Cuba’s healthcare, like its education programmes, is free to all citizens and boasts the world’s highest number of doctors per capita at 95.42 per 10,000 people. It has a mean life expectancy of 78.4 years, normally associated with countries in the global North, from a GDP per capita of just $13,302. By comparison, the US has a slightly higher life expectancy of 82.1 years with a GDP per capita of $80,706. An interesting point of comparison is that Cuba spends 11.8 percent of GDP on socialised healthcare compared to 16.6 percent in the US and yet the US operates a private health system based on profit. In 2023, 25.3 million Americans (9.5 percent) were uninsured, a figure that looks set to rise dramatically following the passing into law of Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act which could cut health insurance coverage for nearly 12 million Americans.
Cuba has also excelled in medical research as well as services. Its biomedical research team advanced vaccine candidates during the Covid-19 pandemic that enabled Cuba to vaccinate its population and share vaccines with partners in the global South. The island’s internationalist approach to healthcare has seen 400,000 Cuban medical professionals work in 164 countries over six decades providing health services without charge in the world’s poorest countries. This health solidarity is also reflected in the work of the Henry Reeve Brigade, an international team of medical specialists in disasters and epidemics comprising 1,586 medical professionals, including nurses, doctors and medical technicians dispatched in response to emergency situations wherever they arise. Their medical missions have included the 2014-16 Ebola outbreak in West Africa when 250 medics risked their lives while fighting the virus in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia. It also dispatched 593 medical workers to 14 countries during the pandemic, including Lombardy, one of the worst hit regions in Italy.
Cuba’s international health solidarity also extends to training doctors in its Latin American School of Medicine (Escuela Latinoamericana de Medicina (ELAM)), which celebrated its 25th anniversary in November 2024, having trained 31,180 physicians for service in 120 countries. The mission of ELAM is to train doctors from the poorest regions and communities of the global South without charge with the proviso that they serve those same communities in their practice.
In a vindictive act designed to sever health ties between Cuba and the countries in which its medics have been serving, the Trump administration has threatened visa restrictions on the leaders of countries that host Cuban medical teams. This was based on the false allegation that the Cuban medical programmes used “forced labour” that amounted to “human trafficking”; again, a policy designed to isolate Cuba cloaked by a disingenuous interest in the welfare of the Cuban people. These are the same people being collectively (and illegally) punished by US sanctions. Also, suffering are the beneficiaries of Cuba’s medical solidarity with the governments of Jamaica, Honduras, Guatemala, Paraguay, the Bahamas, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Guyana formally ending their Cuban medical missions in response to US coercion.
International solidarity
Last month’s Nuestra América aid convoy to Cuba which brought 20 tons of critical supplies for hospitals, schools and families in need was a great example of the solidarity that Cuba enjoys across the world . A total of 650 delegates from 33 countries and 120 organisations brought solar panels, food, medical supplies and powdered milk to the island. They also brought a clear message to the Trump administration: the Cuban political system is not a matter of negotiation but a determination of the Cuban people. At the end of March, a Russian oil tanker broke the US oil embargo carrying an estimated 730,000 barrels of crude oil. A Russian foreign ministry spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, said “Cuba is our closest friend and partner in the Caribbean, and we don’t have the right to abandon it”. This is a sign that Cuba’s international allies are not willing to step aside and allow the US to slowly strangle the Cuban economy into submission. It was followed by remarks from Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, that “her country has every right to send fuel to Cuba, whether for humanitarian or commercial reasons”. These developments harbour hope that Cuba’s allies in the global South, particularly Latin America, will support the island in its greatest need. Cuba has offered solidarity to much of the world for more than sixty years and now needs that solidarity to be reciprocated.
“Cuban eye doctors in Jamaica are the only reason why my grandmother didn’t go fully blind in one eye after she got a botched surgery. The work they’ve done for rural and poor Jamaicans is immeasurable”, wrote a Twitter user last week after the first set of Cuban doctors and nurses left Jamaica.
Two weeks ago, hundreds of Jamaicans marched in a “gratitude walk” to thank Cuba for the 50 years of medical solidarity that they have received. Meanwhile, others on the island have been reportedly rushing to get eye treatment at clinics before Cuban doctors were set to depart. A few weeks ago in Honduras, people were in tears as they applauded and thanked Cuban doctors for their years of service, particularly in providing free eye surgeries. If this is clearly contrary to the interests of people, why are all Cuban doctors, nurses, biomedical engineers, and technicians leaving?
They are not leaving because these countries want them to, but because the United States is forcing them to.
Last year, the United States threatened to cancel U.S. visas for leaders of countries that have Cuban doctors working in them, as part of a decades-long campaign of aggression to destroy Cuba’s medical solidarity, which has saved over 12 million lives across the world. In reaction to this coercion, the governments of Jamaica, Honduras, Guatemala, Paraguay, the Bahamas, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Guyana have formally ended the Cuban medical missions after decades. The governments of Grenada, Antigua and Barbuda, and Calabria in Italy have committed to gradually reducing Cuban medical missions. The US is forcing countries to end decades-long relationships with Cuba to further isolate the island from the world, all at the expense of the access and quality of healthcare for millions of people.
Cuba has carried out 30 million medical consultations in Honduras, 900,000 surgeries, and 80,000 eye surgeries. Many of the doctors were working in a free ophthalmology clinic in San Jose de Colinas in Santa Barbara as part of the Venezuelan-Cuban Operation Miracle, which provided free eye care to millions. Now, 150 Cuban doctors have left the country after the newly elected right-wing government immediately cancelled the medical mission. In Guyana, 200 doctors have left after 50 years of providing health access for people who otherwise would not have had any. Last week, Cuban doctors began leaving Guatemala after the government ended Cuban medical missions, which began in 1998 following Hurricane Mitch to provide critical health services to indigenous communities underserved by the Guatemalan health system. Now, 412 Cuban health personnel are beginning to end their service following a closing of ties with the government of Guatemala and the United States, and a clear willingness to bow down to coercive measures. The Bahamas has terminated its Cuban brigades, opting for discussions with the United States over building a workforce based in Canada to serve the medical system.
During this time, Cuban doctors cared for more than 8,176,000 patients, undertook 74,302 surgeries, attended the births of 7,170 babies, and saved 90,000 lives. With the end of the Jamaica Cuba eye care programme, after 16 years of solidarity and 25,000 instances of people regaining their sight. Despite initially saying that “I will prefer to lose my visa than to have 60 poor and working people die,” the Prime Minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines has chosen to let the 60 patients receive dialysis and critical care from Cuban doctors lose their care with the end of the Cuban medical missions to the country.
Not all countries are accepting this attempted coercion and sacrifice of the health of their nation. Trinidad and Tobago and Calabria in Italy have refused to cancel the Cuban medical missions. The Trinidadian President said, “I just came back from California, and if I never go back there again in my life, I will ensure that the sovereignty of Trinidad and Tobago is known to its people and respected by all.”
History of medical solidarity
In 1960, medical aid was sent to Chile after the Valdivia earthquake. But it was 1963 that marked the start of Cuban medical brigades. 58 medical personnel travelled to Algeria to support in rebuilding the health system after the victory of the independence movement in booting out French colonialists. Fidel Castro gave a speech at the opening of a new medical school in Cuba, hours after meeting Ben Bella, Algeria’s President:
“Most of the doctors in Algeria were French, and many have left the country. There are four million more Algerians than Cubans, and colonialism has left them with many diseases, but they have only a third — and even less — of the doctors we have…That’s why I told the students that we needed 50 doctors to volunteer to go to Algeria.
I’m sure there will be no shortage of volunteers…Today we can only send 50, but in 8 or 10 years’ time, who knows how many, and we will be helping our brothers…because the Revolution has the right to reap the rewards it has sown.”
This act of revolutionary solidarity, just four years after the revolution, marked the start of decades of solidarity from Cuba to the world. Since then, more than 600,000 Cuban doctors and health workers have provided healthcare to 165 countries. In fact, there are still Cuban medical brigades operating in 15 Algerian provinces, mainly to reduce maternal and infant mortality.
In 2004, Cuba and Venezuela launched Operación Milagro (Operation Miracle), aimed at providing free eye care and surgeries for people suffering from preventable blindness and other visual impairments. The program restored vision to more than 4 million people across 34 years in just 15 years. This historic program is being forcibly shut down as the US pushes Cuban doctors out of countries today, breaking one of the world’s most remarkable progressions in health provision.
In 2005, following Hurricane Katrina’s devastating impacts in the United States, Cuba created the Henry Reeve International Contingent to respond to natural disasters and health epidemics. While the Bush administration refused Cuban help in responding to Hurricane Katrina, this incredible mission has sent 90 brigades to 55 countries to respond to COVID-19 in Europe and Latin America, Ebola in West Africa, cholera in Haiti, and more. In 2020, the Henry Reeve International Contingent was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
In 2014, Cuba provided the only permanent brigade to support Sierra Leone, Guinea-Conakry, and Liberia in dealing with the Ebola epidemic. No other country or international organisation provided long-term support for the countries. It was Cuban doctors who managed to successfully contain the epidemic.
In March 2020, as COVID was declared by the World Health Organization as a pandemic, Cuban doctors immediately travelled to Lombardy in Italy, the epicenter of the pandemic, Angola, as well as Latin American countries, including Venezuela and Suriname, to provide support. When a COVID-positive cruise ship with over 600 people onboard was refused docking in every Caribbean country, it was Cuba that allowed them to dock in “a shared effort to confront and stop the spread of the pandemic.” As the US blockade prevented Cuba from accessing vaccines, they manufactured their own – and five of them at that. The blockade slowed down the process significantly, given the lack of medical equipment permitted into the island, the limited research laboratories, and the inability to access enough syringes for mass vaccination. It is only because of the resilience and humanity of Cuban doctors and researchers and the international solidarity of organisations, including CODEPINK, in donating syringes, that Cuba managed to not only protect its population from the pandemic but also export them to the world. In fact, the vaccines produced by Cuba did not require refrigeration, unlike most manufactured in the Global North, given the lack of access to facilities, particularly as they were distributed far across the island. This meant that the vaccine could be sent successfully to countries across the Global South with similar lack of access to refrigeration to protect those otherwise shut out of Global North supply chains. In the face of attacks, Cuba’s resilience is a benefit for all humanity.
Campaign of destruction
The United States has sought to interrupt, discredit, and dismantle this enormous feat as part of its attempts to destroy the Cuban revolution. Cuba’s ability to provide medical missions, despite the 66-year-long genocidal blockade, is a testament to the indestructible resolve of the Cuban people and the country’s commitment to humanity.
On February 23 of this year, the State Department sent a sensitive memo to Marco Rubio, which outlined a strategy of coercing countries in Latin America to boot out Cuban medical missions over the next 2-4 years. These attacks on Cuba’s medical missions were an escalation in the US’s war of imperialist aggression on the island for daring to commit to solidarity and peace, rather than welcome greed and destruction. On March 2nd, Congress approved a law to impose sanctions on any country that has Cuban health workers operating in it. Last August, the Trump administration imposed restrictions and revoked visas from countries working with Cuba on medical missions. Since then, countries have been pulling out of medical missions in fear of US retribution.
Under George W Bush’s presidency, the US set up the “Cuban Medical Professional Parole Program,” which aimed at getting Cuban doctors to desert from their mission and get residency in the United States. This ended under Obama’s administration.
This policy has been carried by a vicious propaganda war that has sought to label Cuban medical missions as “forced labour” and Cuban doctors as “slaves”. While this is a frankly offensive and disrespectful attempt to discredit a revolutionary act of solidarity, it is not only a ruse to justify attacks on Cuban doctors but also a fundamental revelation about the US. The descendants of slaveowners can tell Cubans they are slaves for supporting countries made victims of colonialism and imperialism, but refuse to acknowledge that the transatlantic slave trade was the greatest crime of our time.
Cuba’s medical missions, beyond providing critical health services for millions of people, also provide support for the Cuban healthcare system and economy. When doctors are paid in the countries where they work, their money goes into the public healthcare system to pay the doctors, provide support for their families, as well as patients, doctors, and the healthcare system for the entire island. This is a remarkable act of solidarity for Cubans and the world. The Cuban health system works; in fact, it works so well that Cuba has the highest rate of doctors per capita in the entire world. Whereas, in the United States, people survive depending on whether a company decides they can have a medicine, or if they can afford to pay another large corporation thousands of dollars for the privilege of treating an illness. The US dares to lecture Cuba while more than one-third of Americans cannot afford to access healthcare; while 1.3 million diabetic people ration insulin because the price skyrockets year on year as greedy pharma execs decide; and while over 66% of bankruptcies in the US are because of the costs of healthcare.
It is no wonder that healthcare is a significant target of the US empire’s attacks. Cuba maintains that healthcare is a right, whereas the US affords it as a privilege and arena for profits.
Another critical dimension to Cuba’s medical solidarity is its world-renowned Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM). Founded in 1999, the school provides tuition-free medical education for students from across the world who might otherwise not have access to medical studies. They gain a free medical degree in Cuba, then return to serve their communities back home to develop medical self-sufficiency and sovereignty for their countries. There are over 250 Palestinian students from Gaza studying medicine in Cuba, completely free of charge, in the hopes they will travel back to Palestine and care for their people. Today, there are more than 31,000 doctors in 120 countries who have been trained at ELAM. This truly extraordinary and selfless act of material solidarity is also met with attacks. The U.S. has told St Lucia to stop sending doctors to Cuba for medical studies, which the Prime Minister has warned would cause a “major problem”.
I visited ELAM last year and spent time speaking with two female medical students from Sri Lanka, who were quite excited to see someone else from South Asia in Cuba! I asked them how they found studying at ELAM, living in Cuba, and being taught medicine for free to go back to their communities. They were ecstatic and told me how much they loved being there, and what a unique opportunity it was to become doctors from backgrounds where they otherwise would not have been able to. Their only issue with Cuba was the lack of spicy food!
Also on this trip to Cuba, I met with doctors working in a local hospital outside of Havana. They each shared with pride the different countries they had served in: Angola, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Italy. A similar situation you might find in the United States, or elsewhere in the Global North, is of someone in the military who might tell you with pride how they served in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria. While Cuba’s missions save lives and serve people, U.S. missions massacre people and serve Lockheed Martin.
As more U.S. soldiers are sent to West Asia as part of threats to invade Iran and to kill for the interests of imperialism, it is truly devastating to see Cuban doctors leave hospitals in the Caribbean to the tears of locals who have been helped by them.
The poles could not be more stark. Cuba, the most blockaded country in history, has saved more than 12 million lives with its medical missions. The U.S., a belligerent empire with the biggest economy in the world, has killed as many as 23 million people in 28 countries since the 1950s.
Cuba reveals the unfettered barbarity of the United States. That is why they fear a tiny island 90 miles off the coast of Florida. Cuba shows us that the world does not have to be dominated by one empire that violently exploits people, extracts resources, and imposes its own will through F-35s and 2,000lb bombs. Cuba reveals humanity to people who have been propagandised into believing that every person has to look out for themselves, and there is danger and violence at every corner. Cuba unravels the lies that the United States is based on.
So, every single time the U.S. attacks Cuba, discredits its government, its economy, its people, its society, it is trying to protect itself. This has nothing to do with Cuba and everything to do with the U.S. The only future for humanity is an end to the U.S. empire.
U.S. Pressure on Cuba Continues Despite Arrival of Russian Oil Tanker
A Russian tanker carrying around 700,000 barrels of crude oil has arrived in the port of Matanzas, Cuba, breaking the U.S. blockade imposed by President Trump three months ago. Fuel shortages in Cuba have caused dayslong blackouts and have brought all sectors of the country to the brink of collapse.
The White House is claiming the arrival of the Russian tanker, unimpeded by the United States, does not signal a “formal change in sanction policy,” and said U.S. decisions on shipments going forward would be made on a case-by-case basis.
“I think possibly what’s going on is that the administration has begun to worry that their effort to strangle the economy could push the economy over the edge and generate a mass migration crisis,” says William LeoGrande, professor of government at American University.
“Who is the United States? Who gave you the authorization to say how much oil is going into Cuba or not? This is illegal,” adds Liz Oliva Fernández, a Cuban journalist with Belly of the Beast.
Transcript
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman.
A Russian oil tanker has arrived in the port of Matanzas, Cuba, breaking the U.S. blockade imposed by the U.S. three months ago. The tanker is carrying around 700,000 barrels of crude oil. Fuel shortages in Cuba have caused dayslong blackouts, have brought all sectors of Cuba to the brink of collapse. This is Havana resident Ismael de la Luz Caballero.
ISMAEL DE LA LUZ CABALLERO: [translated] I see the arrival of the ship and the fact that they allowed it in very positively. However, we need them to let more shipments through. After all, a single ship amounts to just over 75,000 barrels, and that lasts only 15 days. What happens after that? We’ll be right back to the blackouts and the transportation crisis. Things are in a dire state on that front. The Americans need to let us live a little, to let us breathe, because we’ve reached a point where we can barely breathe anymore.
AMY GOODMAN: The White House is claiming the arrival of the Russian tanker, unimpeded by the United States, does not signal a formal change in sanction policy, and said decisions on shipments going forward would be made on a case-by-case basis. President Trump spoke to reporters aboard Air Force One Sunday.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: If he wants to do that and if other countries want to do it, it doesn’t bother me much. It’s not going to have an impact. Cuba’s finished. They have a bad regime. They have very bad and corrupt leadership. And whether or not they get a boat of oil, it’s not going to matter. I’d prefer letting it in, whether it’s Russia or anybody else, because the people need heat and cooling and all of the other things that you need. Go ahead.
AMY GOODMAN: For more, we’re joined by two guests. In Havana, Cuba, we’re joined by the award-winning journalist Liz Oliva Fernández of the Belly of the Beast. She’s been reporting on the impacts of U.S. sanctions for years. In Washington, D.C., we’re joined by William LeoGrande. He’s a professor of government at American University, specialist in U.S.-Latin American relations and co-author of Back Channel to Cuba: The Hidden History of Negotiations Between Washington and Havana.
We’ll talk about how hard Cuba has been hit by the U.S. sanctions. I mean, President Trump has been threatening countries around the world against delivering aid to Cuba, and oil. Professor William LeoGrande, can you explain what’s happening? Whether or not Trump says it’s not a change in policy, that will surprise countries around the world that he has demanded they not help Cuba. What is going on here?
WILLIAM LEOGRANDE: Well, I think possibly what’s going on is that the administration has begun to worry that their effort to strangle the Cuban economy could push the economy over the edge and generate a mass migration crisis. That obviously is something that will be very contrary to the president’s overall policy of not allowing anybody into the United States, if he can help it.
They’re playing a dangerous game, I think, in the White House. They are tightening sanctions on Cuba in the hope that somehow this is going to force the Cuban government to surrender to their terms at the negotiating table. But if the Cuban government doesn’t surrender, then there is this risk of bringing the economy really to the edge and over the edge of collapse and generating social chaos on the island and mass migration, and then pressure from the Cuban American community for direct military intervention.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But, Professor LeoGrande, isn’t this also a sign that the Trump administration realizes it cannot risk a confrontation with Russia in the Caribbean, while at the same time having to have so many troops and so much military hardware deployed in the Persian Gulf and in Iran, and that they’d rather just let the Russian tanker go through? Because, obviously, they’re still putting a lot of pressure on weaker or smaller countries to maintain the embargo against — or, the blockade against supplies to Cuba.
WILLIAM LEOGRANDE: Well, you know, the tanker was not accompanied by any Russian naval forces, so the administration could have seized it with no real resistance. But this administration very rarely does anything that is confrontational with Russia. And I think this is just sort of par for the course with the Trump administration of wanting to, for whatever reason, stay on good terms with Russia, come what may.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And we’ve heard a lot of talk from both Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Trump about the contours of some kind of a deal with Cuba. And Rubio has been saying that the current president of Cuba has to go. What’s your sense of this, this issue of: Are there back-door talks between the two countries?
WILLIAM LEOGRANDE: Well, it seems there certainly has been sort of preliminary conversations between the two countries. Both governments have confirmed that over the last few days. There was at least one face-to-face meeting between Secretary Rubio’s advisers and Cuban representatives on the island of Saint Kitts during the CARICOM meeting.
But what the United States really wants is still very much unclear. Initially, it sounded like what the United States was most interested in was some kind of economic deal, and even Secretary Rubio was sort of underscoring that in his public statements. Then the Cuban government said that pretty much anything was open to discussion except their internal affairs, and particularly the shape of their government or who their political leaders would be. So the Cubans really drew a red line around that issue of political leadership. After that, Secretary Rubio came out and, in a couple of public statements, was pretty clear that he thinks that the Cuban leadership, in fact, has to change.
So, it’s an open question now whether there is enough common ground between the two countries to reach some kind of agreement around economic issues, which, of course, is what President Trump was interested in primarily in Venezuela, or whether or not we’re going to have a deadlock in these negotiations because the United States insists on infringing, in effect, on Cuban sovereignty by telling them who their leaders can be.
AMY GOODMAN: Secretary of State Marco Rubio denied there’s a naval blockade on Cuba.
SECRETARY OF STATE MARCO RUBIO: [There isn’t] a naval blockade surrounding Cuba. The reason why Cuba doesn’t have oil and fuel is because they want it for free, and people don’t give away oil and fuel for free on a regular basis, unless it was the Soviet Union subsidizing them or Maduro subsidizing them. They just don’t do it. They may get a shipment here or there, or now and then someone — but not enough to sustain their country. … Ultimately, the reason why Cuba is a disaster is because their economic system doesn’t work. It’s a nonsensical system. And the people of Cuba are suffering because of the decisions — because of the unwillingness of the people who govern that country to make the changes that need to be made so they can join the 21st century. It is sad that the only place — Cubans can only be successful if they leave the country. That’s a very sad thing. You see Cubans go all over the world and find success, except in Cuba.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s Cuban American U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Liz Oliva Fernández, you’re a Cuban journalist in Havana right now. If you can respond to what he’s saying, saying that there is not a naval blockade, and also talk about — while he allows in a Russian oil tanker, for example, when it comes to Mexico, hasn’t Mexico said that they would be threatened with tariffs by Trump if they sent this kind of oil to Cuba?
LIZ OLIVA FERNÁNDEZ: I don’t need to respond to that, because President Trump already did. Like, it’s funny, like, as many times these people are, like, fighting each other. They say — the things that they say don’t have any sense. They said there is not an oil blockade, but then they are threatening people, threatening countries, with tariff if they just, like, try to get oil to Cuba. And then the President Trump say, “Well, we are going to allow this.” And then the secretary of — in the White House, the press conference, they say, “Well, we need to see case by case.” Like, what is the point, if there is not an oil blockade?
And I think, like, the things — it’s not like they talk about this. I think, like, the bother me the most is like when the people phrase it and then they allow it, like this is legal. So, what is — what is the United States doing? Who said that the United States can’t allow how many oil or who is sending oil to Cuba? Who is the United States? Who give you the authorization to say how many oil going into Cuba or not? Like, this is illegal. They can’t do that and say that they allow it. We are, like, legitimize an action that is illegal itself.
And also, for me, it’s complicated to understand. Like, I don’t get it. Like, I know that they are lying, but I don’t get it, how they can just stand and say that this is not affecting the people. How many countries around the world can just survive without oil? Like, oil is a fundamental part of everything.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Liz Oliva Fernández, it’s not clearly just oil for —
LIZ OLIVA FERNÁNDEZ: Like technology.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Liz Oliva, it’s not just about oil, as well, as we know for decades now the United States has been blockading and mounting a solo embargo against Cuba, condemned by virtually every country in the United Nations General Assembly. What’s been the impact of these decades of economic isolation that the United States has sought to put Cuba in on the people of your country?
LIZ OLIVA FERNÁNDEZ: First, I need to say that, no, like, we haven’t — they have maintained a blockade for more than 60 years now. But not all the eras, not all the times on all the periods are the same. There are times like they shrink as much as it can, as has happened since the first Trump administration and this one.
For example, to put you in context, when we are looking at, like, infant mortality in Cuba, in 2018, there was four per 1,000 kids. And now, after all the sanctions that the United States and Trump administration first, then Biden had just maintained the things like it is, and then Trump again, like, the mortality, infant mortality, in Cuba has raised until 10. That’s crazy. That’s how much impact the U.S. sanctions has in Cuba, and not just infant mortality. Let’s talk about expectancy of life. Cuba has one of the expectancy of life that could be compared with other Western Hemisphere — Western countries, sorry.
And then they have been, like, getting in the — the impact of the sanctions are cruel, because it’s not just like they are, like, putting sanctions on. This is like on a war between the United States and Cuba. This is an isolation. They are trying to asphyxiate the Cuban people in order that we want to overthrow our own government.
When they say, “Oh, we don’t want” — we don’t know — we are not sure what they want. They want regime change, not because I say it, because they write it down in the ’60s. They have been wanting regime change since always. And I think, like, this is the first time in my life and experience, like, people are tired in Cuba. We don’t want to go through this anymore. So, people want to something happen.
AMY GOODMAN: Liz Oliva Fernández, I want to thank you for being with us, Cuban journalist with Belly of the Beast, speaking to us from Havana. She’s not just reporting on the sanctions and blockade; she is living it. William LeoGrande, professor at American University, co-author, with Peter Kornbluh, of Back Channel to Cuba: The Hidden History of Negotiations Between Washington and Havana.
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