{"id":42876,"date":"2026-07-15T07:15:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T14:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=42876"},"modified":"2026-07-30T22:25:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T05:25:15","slug":"cubas-future-remains-in-limbo-while-trumps-unpredictable-foreign-policy-offers-no-clear-path-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/cubas-future-remains-in-limbo-while-trumps-unpredictable-foreign-policy-offers-no-clear-path-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"Cuba\u2019s future remains in limbo while Trump\u2019s unpredictable foreign policy offers no clear path forward"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Juan Carlos Albarran<\/a>, Miami University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As I consider the dire economic and political turning point my home country of Cuba is facing today, the words of Cuban singer Willy Chirino\u2019s \u201cNuestro d\u00eda ya viene llegando (Our day is coming)<\/a>\u201d come to mind like they did in the 1990s:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHoy que mi pueblo vive ilusionado, yo me siento inspirado y un Son<\/a> estoy cantando anunci\u00e1ndole a todos mis hermanos, que nuestro d\u00eda viene llegando.\u201d This translates to, \u201cNow that my people live filled with hope, I feel inspired and a Son I am singing, telling all my brothers, that our day is coming.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many Cubans in the diaspora of nearly 3 million in the U.S.<\/a>, including some of my own friends and family members, believe the days of the Cuban failed political system on the island are almost over.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a Cuban American and a senior lecturer in global and intercultural studies<\/a>, I am curious and concerned about what the country\u2019s next chapter will be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Memories of Havana<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Growing up in Havana\u2019s Chinatown neighborhood<\/a>, I witnessed firsthand Cuba\u2019s economic transformation in the early 1990s, during the euphemistically named \u201cSpecial Period in a Time of Peace<\/a>\u201d following the collapse of the USSR.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time, I was completing my compulsory military service. I saw how the supplies provided by the Eastern Bloc to the Cuban military started to dwindle. Little by little, basic supplies, such as boots and uniforms, were no longer being replaced when they got worn out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back home during my weekends off, I started to see changes in my neighborhood. Privatization and commercialization were taking over my old street. The building across from our apartment was being remodeled into a three-story Chinese restaurant called El Pac\u00edfico. The many Cuban and Chinese families who had lived there were relocated to apartments on the outskirts of Havana.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chinatown was open for business. This was the first of many neighborhoods in Havana that started to be commodified for tourism in the 1990s. Nevertheless, Cuba\u2019s government maintained its socialist messaging to the Cuban people: Collective ownership and equality can be provided and guaranteed only by the socialist state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But at the same time, it was making agreements with international capitalist enterprises, such as the hotel chain then called Sol Meli\u00e1<\/a>, or other projects, including Fidel Castro\u2019s international promotion of Cohiba cigars<\/a>. And these contradictions were becoming harder to hide from the people in changing neighborhoods like Chinatown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"gate
The Friendship Gate at the entrance of Havana\u2019s Chinatown was built in 1999 to make the neighborhood more appealing to tourists. David Silverman\/Getty Images News<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A nuanced authoritarianism<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In the early years after the revolution that brought Fidel Castro\u2019s government to power in 1959, the government held popular tribunals<\/a> in which those perceived as standing in the way of socialist ideals were put on trial. Most of the accused were found guilty without due process and either endured long prison sentences or faced execution squads<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This dogmatic approach to revolutionary citizenship led to the horrible treatment of any perceived as nonconformist, such as LGBTQ people, hippies or punks. These dissidents were sent to labor camps designed to transform \u201cquestionable\u201d people into Che Guevara\u2019s ideological concept of the \u201chombre nuevo\u201d \u2013 the new revolutionary man<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But in the past 20 years, Cuba\u2019s more progressive social policies have helped to redeem the authoritarian excesses of the revolution\u2019s early years. This has helped to guarantee the government\u2019s survival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the few Latin American countries to legalize gay marriage<\/a>, Cuba has also gained a global reputation in its many advances toward gender equity<\/a>. In fact, Mariela Castro, Ra\u00fal Castro\u2019s daughter, is now the leading voice of the LGBTQ+ movement in Cuba<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those most affected by the U.S. sanctions<\/a> and Cuban government antipathy are \u201clos cubanos de a pie<\/a>,\u201d that is, \u201cCubans on foot.\u201d This is a large majority of the population that has very little income, no connection to the government and no access to the new private-public partnership business model in Cuba known as \u201cmipymes<\/a>\u201d and no remittances from relatives living abroad. Today, they are crying out for a change \u2013 any change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What has \u2013 and hasn\u2019t \u2013 happened in Venezuela<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The tactics used by President Donald Trump\u2019s administration on Jan. 3, 2026, to capture Venezuelan president Nicol\u00e1s Maduro<\/a> set the road map for what many in the diaspora expected would follow in Cuba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many Latinos, including Cubans and Cuban Americans living in the United States, were in favor of this action, especially the old generation of Miami Cuban and Venezuelan exiles<\/a> who have long supported the Republican Party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the island, many Cubans are willing to accept a U.S. invasion<\/a> if it means things will change. They feel that if Cubans are not going to have access to any of their country\u2019s resources, it might as well be in the hands of the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What very few have discussed publicly, however, both in the Cuban community and outside of it, is what has \u2013 or has not \u2013 happened in Venezuela since the U.S. took Maduro. Few are asking: Has the political system really changed? Is Venezuela better off now than under Maduro?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump has yet to publicly state his aims for the future of Venezuela, outside of taking over its oil industry<\/a>. The U.S. appointed acting President Delcy Rodriguez<\/a> on Jan. 5, 2026, but it\u2019s not clear what this bodes for Latin American sovereignty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A U.S. military capture of Cuban President Miguel D\u00edaz-Canel and even the aged Ra\u00fal Castro, who has been indicted by the U.S. judicial system<\/a>, might have symbolic power but, in my opinion, is not likely to repopulate Havana\u2019s Palacio de Gobierno with fresh political perspectives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Cuba, the trappings of the old regime remain deeply rooted in the country\u2019s political infrastructure, and the threat of U.S. military intervention is nothing new for the Cuban government that has outlasted many U.S. administrations<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Cuban government also knows it can create chaos in the Caribbean by unleashing another migratory crisis<\/a>. This leverage, of course, comes at the expense of \u201clos cubanos de a pie.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s next for Cuba<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The Cuban economy, heavily reliant on tourism<\/a>, faces unprecedented pressures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the specter of U.S. intervention looming, many foreign companies operating on the island have decided to leave<\/a>. The abrupt departure of companies<\/a> such as mining company Sherritt International and the SOL by Meli\u00e1<\/a> hotel chain has undermined mining, tourism and energy in Cuba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And in June 2026, Trump further hardened sanctions with an executive order that punishes companies doing business with Cuban companies<\/a>. This additional economic pressure seems to be creating some momentum and fragmentation to force the Cuban government into a dialogue that favors the U.S. agenda<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Add to this the fact that oil imports from Venezuela and other countries, including Mexico and Russia, have dissipated<\/a>, causing a major energy crisis<\/a>, and it\u2019s clear that change is urgently needed \u2013 but in which direction?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Uncertainty and hope remain<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As days pass, the uncertainty remains, and the voice of the Cuban people is obscured behind the political clamor between the Cuban and U.S. governments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like Willy Chirino, I long for a day when I can come back to Cuba with my now-teenage children to show them where I was born and introduce them to their relatives still living on the island, with the hope of building a real future together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the meantime, as I sip a cortado<\/a> in a Midwestern college town, another 1990s popular song<\/a> comes to mind. It comes from Los Van Van, a Cuban band formed during the exciting early revolutionary years, beloved by Cubans inside and outside the island: \u201cOrula, para todos los Cubanos, Ash\u00e9 yo te pedir\u00e9,\u201d which translates to, \u201cOrumila, Yoruba deity, blessings for all the Cubans is what I am asking for.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Juan Carlos Albarran<\/a>, Senior Lecturer of Global and Intercultural Studies, Miami University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Juan Carlos Albarran, Miami University As I consider the dire economic and political turning point my home country of Cuba is facing today, the words of Cuban singer Willy Chirino\u2019s \u201cNuestro d\u00eda ya viene llegando (Our day is coming)\u201d come to mind like they did in the 1990s: \u201cHoy que mi pueblo vive ilusionado, yo […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":42877,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,46,10,25,296,36,4,38],"tags":[17941,252,17944,1590,3181,17942,885,891,886,860,14506,6353,17943,17013,1589,513,11755,17918,514,17340,17339,2811],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42876"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42876"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42876\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42878,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42876\/revisions\/42878"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}