Cuba And The United States

Cuba “held an economical potential that attracted American business interests and a strategic significance for any Central American canal” (Goldfield, Abbott and Anderson, p 638). Cuban rebellion “erupted again in 1895 in a classic guerrilla war… [and] American economic interests were seriously affected” (book pg638). The Spaniards started confining the locals to concentration camps “where tens of thousands died of starvation and disease” (book pg 638). This gained a lot of publicity throughout America as journalist’s were reporting the harsh treatment, which helped persuade our nation to intervene. Furthermore, this led to growing tension between Spain and

Another reason forimplementing the embargo on Cuba concerns the corrupt communist government andUS hopes of promoting a transition to a democratic system. On February 3, 1962,President Kennedy was confident that “Castro was moving toward theestablishment of a to! talitarian regime in alliance with the Soviet Union”(DeVarona 7). This raised a huge national defense issue since Cuba is only 90miles from US soil. The US government claims that the transition from communismto democracy will help Cuba flourish, as other democratic countries in thewestern hemisphere have. (“Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act of1996”).

During the Cold War, relations between Cuba and the United States were icy. Cuba was allied with the USSR, America’s enemy, and was well within their sphere of influence. With events like the failed Bay of Pigs invasion and the Cuban Missile Crisis happening on their soil, Cuba was at the center of the Cold War. Between ideological differences and their alliance with Russia, Cuba became an enemy of America as well. It took the efforts of ten American presidents, six Popes, and countless other actors, but Cuba and America are finally in the process of normalizing relations. There is still work to be done, but the path is clear and the time is right. However, one cannot simply ignore the last fifty years. In that time, millions of lives were affected by the lack of social, economic, and political ties between the U.S. and Cuba. In this paper, I will analyze the last fifty years of U.S. - Cuban relations by looking at the involved actors, their means, and their values and interests through the lenses of two paradigms, realism and constructivism.

American international relations with Cuba have almost always been tense. The cold war solidified the growing negative relations, and the embargo embodied it. But now that the cold war is over, as is the Cuban missile crisis, we’re left to wonder if the embargo is really necessary. Should the United States lift the embargo of Cuba? All of the evidence, be it economic, diplomatic, or social, points to yes. We should lift the embargo.

When Fidel Castro took over Cuba by means of a revolution, he quickly established his government as the first openly Communist government in the western hemisphere. He petitioned the Soviet Union for aid, which was cheerfully given him. These events went against our current policies, as well as the Monroe Doctrine, which established us as the police force of the western hemisphere. Ninety miles away from the greatest bastion of Capitalism was now residing its greatest foe. This tense situation was brought to a boiling point by the arrival of

While the Cold War does not mark a significant distinction from US involvement in Latin America pre-Cold War, the inclusion of ideology in US foreign policy decisions did mark a change in attitudes and focus. While US policy can be described as rational to a certain point, the Cuban dilemma caused an irrational fear in US foreign policy makers to avoid a second-Cuba. The fear of a “second Cuba” can be seen in the various interventions by the US in Latin America during this period.

Cuba is the country best known for being at the center of the Cold War conflict between the U.S. and Russia because of the Cuban Missile Crisis. The Soviet Union’s strategy, and the anticipated U.S. response to the Russian strategy, is described in an October 19, 1962 telegram from Andrei Gromyko, Russia’s Foreign Minister, to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union [Virtual Archive]. The Central Committee was the highest organization within communist Russia. Gromyko seems to have written the telegram to inform the Central Committee that the Russian strategy in aligning itself with Cuba seemed to be working. In the telegram Gromyko expressed his belief that “a USA military adventure against Cuba is almost impossible to imagine” because of “assurances given to us that the USA has no plans for in Cuba (which undeniably commits them in many respects)” (Gromyko). Instead, Gromyko believed that the U.S. efforts would be to try weakening Cuba by obstructing its economy, thinking that over the long term Russia would not be able to continue supporting Cuba with foreign aid in order to offset U.S. economic sanctions against Cuba (Gromyko).

     It was after Castro took power that the United States changed its way in which it dealt with Cuba dramatically. The United States decided it would

In 1959, Fidel Castro was still figuring out how to align Cuba, and what Cuba’s role in the world would be. By late fall of 1959, the Eisenhower administration felt that the US could never “do business with the Castro Government on a basis which could be termed even reasonably satisfactory.” Castro had already “indulged in anti-American propaganda, nationalized U.S. property, proclaimed Cuba's neutralism, and worked with Cuban Communists.” By March 1960, Eisenhower had approved of a plan for the overthrow of Castro. By May 1960, Cuba officially aligned itself with the Soviet Union, and received assistance from the USSR to resist the United States. The failed Bay of Pigs invasion occurred in April 1961, several months prior to Belgrade. A little over a year following the Belgrade Conference saw the Cuban Missile Crisis unfold. Cuba saw the USSR’s actions in this crisis as acting against Cuban interests, and Cuba began to deemphasize relations with the USSR and create closer ties with the NAM countries. While undeniably a controversial candidate for non-alignment, many of Cuba’s values were closer to the NAM’s basic principles. The Non-Aligned countries believed in strengthening their independence by pushing back on economic and political colonialism, and bridging the gulf between the wealthy and poorer nations of the planet. They were in full support of Cuba’s stance, even supporting Cuban frustration with the US base on

During the early days of the rule of Fidel Castro, the Soviet Union heavily supported the new Cuban Regime, so they supplied Cuba with money, and weapons to defend against the “Invaders off the Cuba” (DePalma). They also supplied Cuba with many military troops to defend Cuba and officers to teach Cuban citizens how to defend for themselves. The Soviet Union supported Cuba because it was a new country and Fidel Castro declared it as a marxist state, which is essentially a communist-socialist country. The marxist state, however only had one party, so the citizens were forced to become a communist community. This was not positive for the citizens because there was only one option for who should be in power. Since there were only one legal party in Cuba, the citizens were not able to voice their opinions on which party should be next because they are in jail. But eventually, this lead to the Soviet Union putting nuclear missiles in Cuba for defensive purpose. This caused the United States to react when they found out they had nuclear weapons. The United States ordered the removal of the nuclear weapons, and as expected the Soviet Union and Cuban government rejected this request. This lead to the coldest days of the cold war, where the United States contemplated invading Cuba to use brute force to take away the nuclear weapons themselves. But they, luckily, did not invade Cuba to get rid of the nuclear weapons, instead the United States ordered a blockade from Cuba and the Soviet Union (History Staff). This was the coldest days of the Cold war, where the Soviet Union and United States were ready to fire their missiles at each other at any moment in time. This impacted the Cuban citizens because they were going to be the

Another consequence of the United States withdrawing her hand from barring the totalitarian grip of Communism was the 1950s insurgency of Communist Fidel Castro in Cuba. In 1959, after years of conflicts with the incumbent

From the time, Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba tensions ran high between the Cuban government and the United States government. Relations between Cuba and the United States grew during Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations. Not as much during the Eisenhower administration as the Kennedy administration did tensions between between the two countries intensify. Kennedy faced many a different situations as President. He faced such situations like the Bay of Pigs Invasion and the Cuban Missile Crisis. Tensions have mounted high for a long time between Cuba and the United States.

Castro’s involvement with the foreign and domestic politics during the early Cold War period greatly influenced the outcome of the Cuban Revolution. Without the actions taken by foreign powers like the United States and Russia, some events on the domestic front may have had very different results. It is important to understand how every nation’s foreign policies can influence more than just one other nation, and this was especially true for Cuba. It was this mix and chain of events which produced the communist Cuba that we are familiar with today.

Although the first and second image analyses are valid, the third image also presents a strong argument as to why the US nominalized relations with Cuba. International opinion on the Cuban embargo has been overwhelmingly negative. Since the end of the Cold War, the international community has largely recognized that the necessity for the US to continue its embargoes has diminished. When Cuba shot down two American planes in 1996, sanctions against Cuba were tightened as retaliation. There exists a hypocrisy that the US would back dictators elsewhere but continue to punish Cuba.

From a global standpoint, the situation between Cuba and the United States was only increasing tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union. As Castro became more communist, he began to develop a strong economic and military relationship with the Soviet Union. As Castro and the Soviet Union developed this relationship, one might ask why Cuba was willing to give up some of its autonomy to the Soviets. After all, the Cubans had just broken free from United States’ control and finally had full and complete sovereignty; why after this revolution would Cuba immediately revert back to a system where a superpower had power over them? From a realist perspective, Cuba had much to gain in terms of relative power from this relationship. Not only did they become allies with one of the world’s largest superpowers, thus giving them increased security, they also received several weapons shipments from the Soviets. Hence, Cuba came to look stronger and have more relative power by this relationship with the Soviets. Realists also note that the USSR benefitted from this relationship; in a time when the US and USSR were going tit-for-tat in terms of power and arms, the USSR successfully expanded their power bases to the Western Hemisphere, bringing communism and the Soviets closer to the US and expanding their power relative to the United States. This