USA amends blockade against Cuba
Is an Obama-like opening on the horizon?
On May 28, 2024, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the U.S. Department of the Treasury announced amendments of the regulations governing its Cuba sanctions program. According to a press release, the changes will increase support for Cuban private entrepreneurs.
The May 28 press release notes that U.S. entities and citizens are now authorized to provide several internet related services to Cuban nationals, including social media platforms, video conferencing, automated translations, web maps, and remote data storage, among others. In addition, software and mobile applications and other internet services of Cuban origin can now be re-exported from the United States to third countries, thus expanding the capacity of Cuban entrepreneurs to offer products on the world market. Moreover, Cuban entrepreneurs are now authorized to open and remotely use bank accounts in the United States.
The U.S. maneuver signals a possible turn toward a policy similar to the Obama opening, which was intended to promote regime change in Cuba by strengthening the private entrepreneurial sector, thereby building a social and economic base for an internal opposition in Cuba, which would be supported from the USA through the strategies of unconventional war. The May 28 announcement occurs shortly after the removal of Cuba from a spurious list of nations that are not cooperating with the war against terrorism, thus signaling a possible change in policy with respect to Cuba.
Up to now, the Cuba policy of the Biden administration has been continuous with that of the Trump administration, which reversed the Obama opening. The Trump-Biden policy has been characterized by the intensification of the blockade through the application of Title III of the Helms-Burton Law and through the inclusion of Cuba on a second spurious list, consisting of countries that supposedly sponsor terrorism. These measures have empowered the U.S. government to block commercial and financial transactions with Cuba by companies and banks in third countries. It is a question of a policy of asphyxiating the Cuban economy, in order to provoke popular discontent with the government.
The Trump-Biden policy has provoked shortages of fuel, production inputs, and foreign currency in Cuba, leading to shortages in food, energy, and transportation. The policy has led to increased dissatisfaction with the economy among the people. However, the government is addressing the economic crisis through creative and well-conceived adjustment policies, implemented with much energy. The intensified blockade has not succeeded in provoking political instability.
By themselves, the measures announced on May 28 will likely be of benefit to private entrepreneurs, but the growth of the private entrepreneurial sector will be limited by the asphyxiated conditions of the Cuban economy. For this reason, the May 28 announcement, in conjunction with the removal of Cuba from one of the spurious lists, invites the suspicion that the Biden administration is undertaking an Obama-like turn, possibly as an election campaign strategy.
Of particular interest is the fact that U.S. banks as of May 29 are authorized to process so-called U-turn transactions, which were blocked in 2019 by the Trump administration. These are transactions involving Cuban entities and companies/banks in third countries. Such transactions originate and terminate outside the United States; they are merely passing through U.S. banks. U.S. banks are now authorized to process said transactions, not only involving Cuban entrepreneurs but also Cuban individuals and entities, as long as no person subject to U.S. jurisdiction is a party in the transaction. Depending on what this means and how it is implemented, it could remove an important component of the financial persecution that has been a key dimension of the Trump-Biden intensified blockade.
The blockade of Cuba is consistent with longstanding U.S. imperialist objectives with respect to Latin America and the world. From Kennedy to Obama, the blockade retarded Cuban economic development, but it was not successful in provoking political instability and regime change. Recognizing this, Obama put forth a new imperialist strategy, involving support for a particular economic sector that could function as a potential U.S. ally. Trump reversed Obama, with an intensified blockade that further defied international law and world opinion. But this intensified blockade, even though it stimulated an economic crisis in Cuba and increased emigration, also has failed to provoke political instability. The Cuban government is seeking to construct alternative commercial and financial arrangements, replacing those blocked by the intensified blockade. In this road, the Cuban government has the support of the people, and it is proceeding in accordance with worldwide commercial and financial tendencies in the global South and East. So perhaps officials in the Biden administration are seeing that the intensified blockade also has not worked, and it makes more sense to resurrect the more sophisticated imperialism of Obama, for which Obama has already provided strategies and justifications. Such a move, moreover, might be a good electoral campaign strategy.
In response to the measures announced by the U.S. government, the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a Declaration on May 28. The Declaration notes that the measures are limited; they do not affect the blockade nor the intensification of the blockade in recent years. It notes that the new measures are based on a distorted vision of Cuban reality, which artificially separates the state and private sectors in Cuba, when both form part of a single entrepreneurial system and society.
The Declaration notes that the private entrepreneurial sector and access to Internet have been promoted by Cuba in the exercise of its sovereignty. The United States seeks to use these dimensions of the Cuban economy for political ends, in accordance with its objective of regime change.
The Cuban Declaration concludes with the observation that the Cuban government will study the new measures. If they do not violate Cuban laws, and if they mean an opening that will benefit the Cuban people, even if only a sector of the Cuban people, the Cuban government will not impede their implementation.
If the Biden administration proceeds with an Obama-like opening, the Cuban government can be expected to point out the limited nature of the measures and to call for the elimination of the blockade in its entirety, as a violation of the rights of Cuba to sovereignty and to economic development. The Cuban government can be expected to reiterate its continuous disposition to negotiate normal relations with the United States, without any preconditions imposed; and it can be expected to not impede the application of any measures toward opening, insofar as they do not violate Cuban law.
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