Trump Threatens Cuba: 'Make a Deal' or Endure Decades More Sanctions
Trump's ultimatum to Cuba — align with U.S. interests or starve without Venezuelan oil — isn't a new strategy, it's just a newly-signed memo for a rerun of a very old movie. Washington has been dictating terms to the island nation since the Spanish-American War, punctuated by the Bay of Pigs, numerous assassination attempts on Fidel Castro, and the persistent, choking embargo that has punished
generations of ordinary Cubans. This isn't about 'democracy'; it's about control, a familiar tune played whenever a nation dares to chart its own course outside of U.S. hegemonic preferences, whether that's Cuba in 1959 or Iran today. We heard similar threats aimed at Nicaragua, Venezuela, and countless others across the Global South. How many times must a nation be coerced into a 'deal' before we
acknowledge the 'consequences' are always for the weaker party, ensuring U.S. corporate interests and geopolitical dominance? The 'deal' is always a one-sided proposal, enforced not by negotiation, but by economic strangulation and thinly veiled threats of regime change, wrapped in the banner of 'freedom.'