The U.S. Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, spoke again this Thursday about Cuba from Manila, where he is participating in the ASEAN ministerial summit, delivering a devastating assessment of the island's leadership: the people in charge do not know what they are doing and fear that improving the economy will cost them their power.
The statements came about when journalists asked him what Washington's plan for Cuba is. They wanted to know if the Communist Party would remain in power under different leadership or with the Castros still in charge. Rubio declined to provide details but did not hold back in his assessment of the regime.
"Do you want me to tell you the details of our plan? I won't do that. What I will tell you is this, and it is the truth. The people in charge of Cuba do not know what they are doing. They do not know how to fix their economy. They do not know how to do it. They do not understand basic economic concepts," stated the Secretary of State.
Rubio identified what he described as the central dilemma that has paralyzed Havana for the past decade and a half. "They want to improve their economy to some extent, but they are afraid that if they improve it too much, they will lose political control over the population. That is the dilemma they face."
The head of U.S. diplomacy emphasized that Washington seeks to influence the direction of the island precisely because of its geographical proximity.
"We seek an opportunity to influence the direction they take because it is 90 miles from our shores. We want Cuba to be prosperous and free, but as long as the people in charge of Cuba remain in power, the future will be challenging."
Rubio concluded his diagnosis with a clear statement: "It will be difficult for them to make the necessary changes for Cuba to have a better future. They do not understand that they are incompetent."
The words of this Thursday come one day after an extensive press conference in which Rubio described Cuba as a "failed state" on two occasions and announced the beginning of the dispatch of over 100 million dollars in humanitarian aid, distributed exclusively through non-governmental organizations such as Catholic Relief Services and Cáritas Cuba.
In that same appearance on Wednesday, Rubio insisted that the regime resold around 60% of the crude oil it received for free from Venezuela to obtain cash, instead of allocating it to the electrical grid, and noted that Cuba has lost between 10% and 15% of its population since 2021 as a direct consequence of the regime's mismanagement.
The context of these statements is a sustained escalation of American pressure on Havana. The Trump administration has imposed more than 240 sanctions against the regime, reduced the flow of oil to the island by between 80% and 90%, and deployed the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier in the Caribbean since May 20 as part of Operation Southern Spear.
The president Trump himself issued a warning on July 16 that still echoes: “Many things are going to happen in Cuba in the next perhaps two months”.
The regime, for its part, has systematically rejected Washington's initiatives. Chancellor Bruno Rodríguez called the humanitarian aid a "tale," while Vice Chancellor Carlos Fernández de Cossío described it as a "dirty political business."
Rubio, however, did not dismiss dialogue: "We are willing to engage in dialogue", he said on Wednesday, although he conditioned any progress on whether those currently in power on the island decide to move in a different direction.
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