Sanctions: The Perennial Siege
Same playbook, different decade: The enduring US pressure campaign on Cuba. The current headline about Russian tourists evacuating Cuba due to a US-imposed 'oil blockade' isn't an isolated incident; it's the latest iteration of a pressure campaign stretching back over six decades, consistently using economic strangulation as a tool of regime change: FIRST INSTANCE: The Bay of Pigs & Operation
Mongoose (1961-1962) Records from the US State Department and CIA document an elaborate covert operation, 'Operation Mongoose,' approved in November 1961 by President Kennedy. Its explicit goal was to foment rebellion and overthrow Fidel Castro. While the Bay of Pigs invasion failed, the economic isolation tactics began in earnest. The initial US embargo, imposed in 1960 and expanded in 1962,
targeted Cuban imports and exports, including oil, aiming to 'weaken the economic life of Cuba' and 'bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government.' (Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Lester D. Mallory, 1960 memo). REPETITIONS: The Helms-Burton Act & 'Wet-Foot, Dry-Foot' (1996-2000s) Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Cuba's economy suffered immensely. Rather than easing
restrictions, the US tightened them with the Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity (Libertad) Act, commonly known as Helms-Burton, signed into law in March 1996. This legislation codified the embargo and extended its reach extraterritorially, penalizing foreign companies investing in Cuba. Simultaneously, the 'wet-foot, dry-foot' policy, while framed as humanitarian, incentivized dangerous