Cuba faces uncertain future after US topples Venezuelan leader Maduro
The two governments are so close that Cuban soldiers and security guards were often bodyguards of the Venezuelan president, and Venezuela’s oil kept the economically struggling island limping along for years. Over the weekend, Cuban officials said 32 people were killed in the surprise attack “following fierce resistance in direct combat against the attackers or as a result of the bombing of facilities.”
The Trump administration has publicly warned that overthrowing Maduro would help achieve another decades-old goal: dealing a blow to the Cuban government. Separating Cuba from Venezuela could have disastrous consequences for its leaders, who on Saturday called on the international community to stand against “state terrorism.”
On Saturday, Trump said the struggling Cuban economy would worsen with Maduro’s ouster.
“It’s falling,” Trump said of Cuba. “Down for the count.”
Loss of key supporter Many observers say Cuba, an island of about 10 million people, wields considerable influence over Venezuela, an oil-rich country with a population three times as large. At the same time, Cubans have long been tormented by rolling power outages and shortages of basic food. And in the wake of the attack, they woke up to the possibility of an even worse future, once unimaginable.
“I can’t speak. I have no words,” said Berta Luz Sierra Molina, 75, as she cried and put her hand to her face. Regina Mendez, 63, said “we have to stay strong” even though she is too old to join the Cuban army.
“Give me a rifle and I’ll go fight,” Mendez said.
Jorge Pinon, a Cuban energy expert at the University of Texas at Austin Energy Institute, said Maduro’s government has been shipping an average of 35,000 barrels of oil per day over the past three months, representing about a quarter of total demand.
“The critical question we cannot get an answer to: Will the United States allow Venezuela to continue providing oil to Cuba?” he said.
Pinon noted that Mexico once supplied Cuba with 22,000 barrels of oil a day, but that figure later dropped to 7,000 barrels after U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio visited Mexico City in early September.
“I don’t think Mexico will step in right now,” Pinon said. “The US government would go crazy.”
Ricardo Torres, a Cuban economist at the American University in Washington, said the “records are significant and Venezuela is still sending some oil.”
“Now imagine a future where you lose this in the short term,” he said. “This is a disaster.”
Pinon noted that Cuba does not have the money to buy oil from the international market.
“The only ally they have left there in terms of oil is Russia,” he said, noting that Russia sends approximately 2 million barrels of oil to Cuba annually.
“Russia has the capacity to fill the gap. Do they have the political determination or political will to do this? I don’t know,” he said.
Torres also questioned whether Russia would lend a helping hand.
“Meddling in Cuba could jeopardize your negotiations with the United States on Ukraine. Why would you do that? Ukraine is much more important,” he said.
Torres said Cuba should open its doors to the private sector and market and reduce the public sector; These moves could encourage China to step in and help Cuba.
“Are there alternatives? I don’t think there are,” he said.
Rebuilding Venezuela’s oil industry On Monday, Trump said in an interview with NBC News that the US government could compensate oil companies that invest in Venezuela to maintain and increase oil production in Venezuela.
He suggested that the necessary reconstruction of the country’s neglected infrastructure for extracting and transporting oil could occur in less than 18 months.
“I think we can do it sooner than that, but it’s going to cost a lot of money,” Trump said. “A tremendous amount of money will have to be spent, and the oil companies will spend that money and then get reimbursed from us or through revenue.”
It remains unclear how quickly the investment can occur, given uncertainties about Venezuela’s political stability and the billions of dollars that need to be spent.
Venezuela produces an average of 1.1 million barrels of oil per day; That’s down from the 3.5 million barrels per day produced in 1999, before the government took over the majority of oil interests and a mix of corruption, mismanagement and U.S. economic sanctions led to production falling.
