• Security incident: ISF was recently accessed by intruders. Please change your password, and change it anywhere else you used it. Read more

US blockade of Cuba

You should also listen to the last part of the video,"09:57 Propaganda campaign by Marco Rubio + U.S. gov against Cuba," i.e the propaganda that theprestige (and steenkh too, apparently) chooses to believe.
I agreed with @theprestige about Ukrainian propaganda being more trustworthy than Cuban propaganda about whether there are Cubans fighting on the Russian side in Ukraine.

I foolishly chose to follow your link and listen to a journalist who claimed that the U.S. has a massive propaganda campaign against Cuba - which is probably true - but no evidence, particularly not on the subject that I agreed with, ie. the subject of Cubans fighting in Ukraine
 
I don't doubt that you believe what you believe. You foolishly chose to agree with theprestige without any evidence whatsoever.
 
You should also listen to the last part of the video,"09:57 Propaganda campaign by Marco Rubio + U.S. gov against Cuba," i.e the propaganda that theprestige (and steenkh too, apparently) chooses to believe.

Continued from posts 49 and 55:
10:04--> What what you put up there is um something from, I think it's called 'the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation. That is not a serious organization. That's a cutout. They have, to my knowledge, not once had anything published in peer review. They are financed by the U.S. taxpayer. And just to put this in broader context, there is a federally funded disinformation campaign against Cuba financed to the tune every year or at least this year of $52 million a year. Quite a lot with $52 million. You know,the Cuban government doesn't have $52 million to be able to counteract that disinformation.
And most mainstream media basically have been colonized, actually, by that, by those talking points. So you can read in El Pais, extending a little bit beyond the doctor's thing, but you know that there's all these, yeah exactly, that Spain's newspaper reference, right, so a major Rubio talking point is that, you know, after North Korea, Cuba is the major military ally of Putin in Ukraine. And it's true – because a lot of this information is rooted in truth – it's true that there's a lot of Cuban poor devils, mercenaries, that have gone because they want, because, like, their life's so terrible as they see it, there's thousands, I think hundreds, possibly thousands, that have gone to Ukraine to fight for Russia. But what's not true is that, or at least there's no evidence, that the Cuban government is facilitating it or earning. It is just repeating what former CIA people have referred to as 'regime change industry talking points'. That's one.
Another one is the hotels, right. So there's hotel kick [?] Cuba bet on hotels there's a lot of, like, kind of ugly hotels that have gone up here, and because of the sanctions, because of the pandemic, and because of very cynical Biden era policies that tell Europeans, 'if you go to Cuba you cannot easily come to the United States', tourism's collapsed. And so, but you, so you've got this kind of, like, reality created by US economic warfare. And then on another layer, they say, 'Oh, but the military' – because the military's built a lot of the hotels – 'the military is just robbing
the money, there's billions that they're robbing they're just sitting on'. There's no information to sustain it, and it's paid for by the US taxpayer. And in the terms of the medical missions, the main motor of the of the Cuban economy – more than even tourism, even in the good times – was the leasing of professional services. Most of that is medical services. And so it just makes sense, if you're John Bolton, if you're Marco Rubio, if you're Marisio Clavaron and your quest is to demolish the Cuban economy, well, then you're going to take aim at the main, like, earner, aren't you? And that's what they've done with the medical missions.
And so what we can see is that this year, I think six or seven have been closed down in the Caribbean and Central American countries. And they've done that by diplomatic arm twisting, threatening countries that if that they have to kick the Cubans out or else. And that will kill people, right? Those people, those doctors are not going to be replaced as much as they say that, the U.S. No way.
And that diplomatic coercion is complemented – to use an ugly word by this propaganda campaign – that they're slaves. And so this is financed by many many hundreds of thousands or millions a year. No one should take it seriously because there's no evidence offered. But yet, the media
in the US, basically NATO countries, has been taken in hook, line, and sinker by it. And it's very concerning that a propaganda operation like that, it's kind of clunky, you know, like there's actually no evidence. When you speak to the doctors, they're, like,"Yeah, we want to go. We want to go because we earn wages, but we want to go."
Just the notion that can kind of take off in the in the media is just really kind of worrying and a fundamental dereliction of duty. So no, Cuban doctors are not slaves. They're not victims of human trafficking. This is a big disinformation effort and it should be treated with the utmost criticism.

A short (2:15 min) edited version:
Katie Halper on X, April 7, 2026
Journalist @ManInHabana debunks one of the stranger regime change industry talking points of "medical slavery" in Cuba, and exposes a $52 million per year disinformation campaign... brought to you by the U.S. taxpayer!
 
I agreed with @theprestige about Ukrainian propaganda being more trustworthy than Cuban propaganda about whether there are Cubans fighting on the Russian side in Ukraine.

I foolishly chose to follow your link and listen to a journalist who claimed that the U.S. has a massive propaganda campaign against Cuba - which is probably true - but no evidence, particularly not on the subject that I agreed with, ie. the subject of Cubans fighting in Ukraine
If you are a young man in a sanctioned Cuba, going to work in Russia may be seen an option to earn money They can't go to the US or most other countries due to US sanctions. We know lots of other countries nationals have been recruited by the Russians. What there is no evidence for is that Cuba is sending Cuban army units, nor encouraging its citizens to serve in the US military.
 
I agreed with @theprestige about Ukrainian propaganda being more trustworthy than Cuban propaganda about whether there are Cubans fighting on the Russian side in Ukraine.

I foolishly chose to follow your link and listen to a journalist who claimed that the U.S. has a massive propaganda campaign against Cuba - which is probably true - but no evidence, particularly not on the subject that I agreed with, ie. the subject of Cubans fighting in Ukraine
The medical slavery is absolute propaganda.

What is evil is forcing countries not to employ well trained Cuban medical staff. The US doesn't replace them, so people go without care. At the same time the US has cut humanitarian aid so the need is likely to increase. Sanctions aren't supposed to impact on medical services, but they do.

Another example of propaganda is the US claims that Cubas pharmacy industry is dual use and could develop chemical or biological weapons. This is to justify sanctioning pharma which is supposed to be exempt from sanctions under IHL.




 
Cuba’s doctors were a lifeline for the world. Now the Caribbean is shamefully complicit in the US drive to expel them (TheGuardian, April 11, 2026)
Cuban doctors, emissaries of one of the world’s most besieged nations, are being expelled from host nations, contracts terminated, health programmes dismantled. And, in their absence, the poorest will pay – in untreated illnesses, unattended births, undiagnosed cancers. The region is, in effect, amputating its own lifeline – under pressure from the US.
On Friday the Cuban foreign minister Bruno Rodríguez accused the US of “extorting” countries by forcing them to cancel decades-old deals with Havana for the supply of doctors.
(...)
Since then, the US has pushed countries across the region to terminate these agreements, branding them “forced labour” and even “human trafficking” because the Cuban state retains a share of salaries. Conveniently ignoring that these doctors were trained free of charge by the Cuban government, unlike their heavily indebted counterparts in countries such as the UK where medical graduates have the onerous burden of student debt for decades.
 
If you are a young man in a sanctioned Cuba, going to work in Russia may be seen an option to earn money They can't go to the US or most other countries due to US sanctions. We know lots of other countries nationals have been recruited by the Russians. What there is no evidence for is that Cuba is sending Cuban army units, nor encouraging its citizens to serve in the US military.
Not only not encouraging them, but actively discouraging them, actually, which I mentioned in post 237 in particular, and in 247 and 280 in another Cuba thread.
By the way, I don't think only "a young man in a sanctioned Cuba" might be tempted by the offers of being paid to participate in the Russo-Ukrainian war. Some Cubans ex-pats may have seen their jobs abroad disappear and now see joining the Russian army as a way to support their families in Cuba.

As for "other countries nationals," yes, many people from impoverished countries (African countries, in particular) appear to have been recruited as mercenaries to fight for Russia:
Foreign fighters in the Russo-Ukrainian war (Wikipedia)
People who believe U.S. and Ukrainian propaganda will go straight to this paragraph Foreign fighters in the Russo-Ukrainian war: Russian side: Latin American mercenaries (Wikipedia) and ignore the rest.

They will also ignore this:
International Legion (Ukraine): International respons: Cuba (Wikipedia)
The Embassy of Ukraine in Havana attempted to recruit for the International Legion in March 2022. Despite this attempt, most Cuban fighters in Ukraine fight for the Russian side, being recruited with the promise of Russian citizenship or a high salary. Despite this situation, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs strongly rejected the recruitment of fighters for any of the sides involved.

I didn't know about this, but it doesn't surprise me:
International Legion (Ukraine): International response: Denmark (Wikipedia)
Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said on 27 February 2022, that volunteering was "a choice anyone could make."
On 10 March, the Ukrainian Ambassador in Denmark reported that more than 100 Danes had volunteered.
On 7 April, an anonymous Danish volunteer soldier claimed to have killed 100 Russian soldiers during various operations.
On 26 April, a 25 year old was the first Dane to have been confirmed killed in combat.
 
Last edited:
Cuba's president says 'we would die' to defend against U.S. invasion (NBC News, April 12, 2026)
In an exclusive interview with NBC News, Miguel Díaz-Canel stressed the need for dialogue but said Cuba is prepared to defend itself.
Cuban president says he has 'no fear' of US (Occupy Democrats on YouTube, April 12, 2026 – 6:449 min.)
Facing threats of a "takeover" from president Trump, Miguel Díaz-Canel said he is prepared to give his own life.


Cuban president says he has 'no fear' of US (Politico, April 12, 2026)
Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said he has “no fear” of President Donald Trump and his threats to “take” Cuba.
In a wide-ranging interview with NBC’s Kristen Welker that aired Sunday, Díaz-Canel said his country is prepared to fight a U.S. invasion — and that he himself is willing to die for the cause.
(...)
“If that happens, there will be fighting, and there will be a struggle, and we will defend ourselves, and if we need to die, we’ll die, because as our national anthem says, “Dying for the homeland is to live.”
I'm not crazy about the Patria o Muerte slogan, but I haven't lived in a country being threatened by the USA for 60 years.
That the USA pays 'dissidents' to spread lies to justify a hostile takeover is a fairly new thing in the Danish Realm.
 
The medical slavery is absolute propaganda.
What is evil is forcing countries not to employ well trained Cuban medical staff. The US doesn't replace them, so people go without care. At the same time the US has cut humanitarian aid so the need is likely to increase. Sanctions aren't supposed to impact on medical services, but they do.

Medical Brigade returns to Cuba following Jamaica’s decision to end cooperation Granma.cu, Mar 27, 2026)
Cuba’s work in Jamaica is a powerful example of genuine cooperation. In the last 30 years alone, more than 4,700 Cuban medical personnel have provided medical care on the Caribbean island. The historic results of this collaboration speak for themselves:
-More than 8,176,000 patients treated.
-74,302 surgical procedures performed.
-7,170 births attended.
-More than 90,000 lives saved.
Likewise, through the Operation Miracle program, which has been active in Jamaica since 2010, vision has been restored or improved for nearly 25,000 Jamaicans.
The same numbers are mentioned in this video:
Touchdown: Cuban Healthcare Workers Land in Havana (Television Jamaica, Mar 28, 2026 – 4:08 min.)


This looks strange: Number of medical doctors | Jamaica – 2003 to 2024 (Statbase)
 
The right-wing hypocrisy revisited:
The aid flotilla members trust fund babies stayed at a five-star hotel and enjoyed a concert while the rest of the country experienced a blackout. Here's a video taken by an angry Cuban showing the blackout everywhere except that hotel. Can't have the Code Pinkos experiencing what life is like for ordinary Cubans,
Trump going ‘Access Hollywood’ on Cuba and threatening THIS (MS NOW on YouTube, April 14, 2026 – 58:14 min.)
Things are pretty dire in Cuba right now as issues have ratcheted up to an almost unprecedented degree in the last few months. This is happening as President Trump says the U.S. may “stop by” Cuba after it finishes the war in Iran. Meanwhile, Cuba's president says they "would die" to defend against a U.S. invasion. Jon Lee Anderson is a staff writer at The New Yorker. He joins Chris Hayes to discuss the Trump administration’s threats to Cuba, how the current U.S. relationship with Cuba compares to the past and more.


43:45--> Jon Lee Anderson: Now, within that miserable panorama, there are haves and have-nots in Cuba, and amongst the haves are a small number of foreign residents, diplomats and others, these handfuls of business people, some with connections to the governments, some with a wink and a nod from the powers that be, to be importers and so on. In a special move just a month ago by the Trump administration, pointedly to undermine the Cuban government, they allowed a number of these entrepreneurs, who operate out of the United States, to import oil for their needs in Cuba, thus undermining the government.

Chris Hayes: There's all these people, there's this humanitarian sort of flotilla that went to Cuba, a bunch of, sort of journalists, kind of left-wing political activists, to call attention. And then there's this entire right-wing discourse, like, 'Look at these ridiculous hypocrites who are staying at a hotel that has power while the people suffer'.
The reason why the hotel has power is literally because the Trump administration has decided [laughing] that only the private connected entrepreneurs can get any oil. That's why!

Jon Lee Anderson: That's right. That's right.


Jon Lee Anderson seems to have forgotten about the service he and Adam Entous rendered to the Biden administration with their VICE podcast series about the 'syndrome'. He doesn't mention the 'Havana syndrome' at all in his conversation with Chris Hayes!
 
The Trump administration is planning to abduct president Díaz-Canel and/or invade Cuba
First Draft: 🇨🇺 Is Cuba Next? (Zeteo, April 14, 2026)
If Trump doesn't get what he wants, Zeteo is told that one option that has been discussed within the Trump administration is for the US military to conduct another abduction operation against some of Cuban leadership, similar to its kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela early this year.
(...)
Trump's administration appears to be laying the groundwork to run its same Maduro playbook in Cuba. Last month the New York Times reported that the Trump Justice Department is leading "a broad-ranging inquiry into Cuba's leaders and Communist Party officials for drug, immigration, economic, and violent crimes with a goal of bringing fast indictments."
The US president, two of the sources tell us, has grown increasingly frustrated lately with the open defiance from the Cuban government, including its president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, who recently said: "You hear that Cuba is next, that Cuba is going to be next, that there's a way out, that they're going to take over Cuba... We need to responsibly protect our people, protect our project, and protect our country."

Trump Plots MASSIVE CUBA TERROR ATTACK As US Empire FLAILS WILDLY (Secular Talk & Good Policy Guy on YouTube, April 16, 2026 – 9:53 min.)
0:28--> Now, keep in mind the background context here. For over 60 years now, the US has had an embargo on Cuba for the crime of engaging in revolution and ousting the fascist USbacked Batista government and exercising their own sovereignty. So, for decades and decades and decades, the US has been economically terrorizing the nation of Cuba. Now, over the last couple of months under the Trump administration, he has ramped that up to a total blockade. And in the meantime, there's fuel shortages, there's food shortages,there's water shortages, total blackouts across the entire country. Hospitals are breaking down. People are literally dying as a result of this strangulation campaign that is explicitly, you know, being conducted in an effort to harm the civilian population of Cuba to try to initiate some sort of an uprising against their government. So, that's the background context of what we're talking about. And now he's saying, "No, no, no, we may do direct military action on top of that."
 
Trump ORDERS Pentagon to BOMB CUBA Next (Status Coup News on YouTube, April 19, 2026 – 15:47 min.)
Status Coup reporter JT Cestkowski interviewed Zeteo reporter Asawin Suebsaeng about his reporting on the Trump administration's preparations for an imminent Venezuela-style operation to kidnap Cuba's leaders in yet another regime change operation.
 
David Ramírez Álvarez on X, April 22, 2026
uba was able to cover the total demand of electricity in a segment of the night of April 21-22. Since February 8, our country was not able to fully cover the national demand.
This is a direct result of the oil shipment brought from Russia a few days ago.
#LetCubaBreathe

Image

José Luis Granados Ceja on X, April 22, 2026
There’s a deliberate misinformation campaign aimed at trying to convince you that Cuba’s challenges are product of their political system. As soon as Cuba was able to access a little bit of oil, things improved.
Remember this when pundits and politicians try to blame Cuba.

I love CodePink's protest party outside of the Cuban embassy in Washington, D.C.
Salsa & Solidarity Outside the Cuban Embassy in DC (CodePinkAction on YouTube, April 23, 2026 – 1 min.)
 
Aron Rupar on X, April 23, 2026
Rep. Carlos Gimenez: "Cuba poses a security threat to the United States. President Trump has said, 'enough is enough.' We need Cuba to be democratic, free, and we need them to be a friend to the United States, not a foe."

Carlos Giménez insists that Cuba should be a friend to the U.S. and not a threat (CiberCuba, April 23, 2026)
Cuban-American Congressman Carlos Giménez reiterated that Cuba poses a security threat to the United States and that the Trump administration demands that the island become a democratic, free nation and an ally of Washington.

The USA has a weird way of making friends and allies.
 
The USA has a weird way of making friends and allies.
The US has three main ways of making allies:
  1. Help another country win an existential war. (France, the UK)
  2. Make it so the alliance is where the money is. (Saudi Arabia)
  3. Total military defeat, occupation, martial law and a return to democratic self rule if and when the vassal state shows itself ready for such a responsibility. (Germany, Japan)
 
The US has three main ways of making allies:
  1. Help another country win an existential war. (France, the UK)
  2. Make it so the alliance is where the money is. (Saudi Arabia)
  3. Total military defeat, occupation, martial law and a return to democratic self rule if and when the vassal state shows itself ready for such a responsibility. (Germany, Japan)
Where does Israel fit in? Item 2?
 
Polymarket has odds-on for an attack on Cuba by 31 December, so they're probably safe.

Not enough money in it.
 
The US has three main ways of making allies:
  1. Help another country win an existential war. (France, the UK)
  2. Make it so the alliance is where the money is. (Saudi Arabia)
  3. Total military defeat, occupation, martial law and a return to democratic self rule if and when the vassal state shows itself ready for such a responsibility. (Germany, Japan)

The most common method appears to be:
4. Install or support a dictator

List provided by Google AI:
Key Dictators and Authoritarian Leaders Supported by the USA:
  • Augusto Pinochet (Chile, 1973-1990): The CIA provided funding to destabilize the democratically elected socialist president Salvador Allende, backing the 1973 military coup that brought Pinochet to power.
  • Fulgencio Batista (Cuba, 1933–1944, 1952–1959): Supported by the US as a counter to leftist movements, protecting American business interests.
  • Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (Iran, 1953–1979): Restored to power in a 1953 CIA/MI6 coup (Operation Ajax) after nationalizing the oil industry.
  • Suharto (Indonesia, 1967–1998): The US supported Suharto's rise to power, which involved a violent anti-communist purge in 1965-66.
  • Manuel Noriega (Panama, 1983-1989): A CIA asset who became dictator before being ousted by a U.S. invasion.
  • Carlos Castillo Armas (Guatemala, 1954): Installed after a CIA-backed coup overthrew democratically elected Jacobo Árbenz.
  • The Somoza Dynasty (Nicaragua, 1930s-1979): Supported for decades by the U.S. to protect anti-communist interests.
  • Mobutu Sese Seko (Congo, 1965–1997): Backed by the U.S. during the Cold War as a staunch anti-communist ally.
  • Park Chung-hee (South Korea, 1961–1979): Supported for leading a coup and establishing a military dictatorship
Other notable regimes with significant U.S. support included the military junta in Argentina (1976–1983) and various regimes in El Salvador. In many cases, these leaders protected economic interests and, as noted in the provided Al Jazeera article, were supported throughout the Cold War.
One of the links referred to by Google: U.S. policy towards authoritarianism (Wikipedia)
Its Table of authoritarian governments supported by the United States has more than 40 names.
 

ISF - Join now!

Every member here is approved by hand. No bots, no spam, just people who care about evidence and honest debate.

Membership is free!

Create your free account

Back
Top Bottom