Cuba’s future uncertain as US topples Venezuelan leader
Cuban officials lowered flags before dawn to mourn the deaths of 32 security officers they say were killed in a weekend U.S. strike in Venezuela, the island nation’s closest ally; Residents here wonder what the capture of President Nicolás Maduro means for their future.
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.
Cuban officials said 32 people were killed in the surprise attack over the weekend but did not provide further details.
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.”
Many observers say Cuba, an island of about 10 million people, wields significant 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.
Jorge Piñón, a Cuban energy expert at the University of Texas at Austin Energy Institute, said Maduro’s government has shipped 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 is: Will the United States allow Venezuela to continue providing oil to Cuba?”
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.”
Piñón noted that Cuba does not have the money to buy oil from the international market.
“The only ally they have left there regarding oil is Russia,” he said, noting that Russia sends approximately two million barrels a year to Cuba.
“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.
