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By Tom O'Connor
Deputy Editor, National Security and Foreign Policy
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President Donald Trump claims to see the end soon for Cuba, the U.S.'s decades-old stated nemesis just 90 miles from Florida.
He is predicting, after 67 years of communist rule, the “weakened nation” will collapse under the pressure of a U.S. blockade, where no oil has been allowed into the country for four months, save for that carried by a recent Russian tanker.
The Cuban government and people are fighting fiercely to hang on—despite increasingly difficult circumstances.
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Newsweek witnessed the dire conditions firsthand during a four-day visit at the start of April to Havana, a vibrant capital suffering under geopolitical tensions, economic warfare and uncertainty over the future.
The trip circled around an exclusive interview with Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel, his first with U.S. media in three years.
He assumed office in 2018 after a first-term Trump reversed much of the rapprochement established by the Obama administration with his predecessor Raúl Castro. Travel and trade restrictions were once again applied, and the decades-old embargo strengthened.
Now, Trump's second term has brought on an even harsher policy targeting Cuba, which Díaz-Canel has sought to resolve through diplomatic talks.
His country's suffering is no secret, and he spoke openly of the hardships his people faced. But he blamed much of the situation on the U.S.'s new policy—where the White House in January threatened tariffs against any country supplying oil to Cuba, weeks after a U.S. raid removed Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, a key energy ally for Cuba.
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Critics have diagnosed the subsequent energy crisis as a result of fundamental errors within Cuba's communist system, accusing the government of incompetence and neglect in failing to modernize the country's ageing power plants, which rely on a certain form of diesel.
Díaz-Canel framed it as a government doing its best under the current circumstances—for example distributing solar panels— while still striving to improve.
“We have things to conquer, to perfect, and to advance in, areas where the blockade plays a fundamental role in what afflicts us and what holds us back,” Díaz-Canel told Newsweek at the lavish Palace of the Revolution in the capital.
“It is an acknowledgment that we cannot feel complacent about the situation we are currently experiencing,” he continued, “one marked by so many deprivations and so many difficulties in life.”
‘The People Are Bearing The Full Brunt Of The U.S. Blockade'
It’s unclear how Cuba will negotiate its way to a deal with the U.S. Díaz-Canel acknowledged attempts so far at dialogue had been “difficult," not least due to Trump's rhetoric of regime change looming over talks.
The White House meanwhile says that Cuba's "leaders want to make a deal and should make a deal, which President Trump believes 'would be very easily made.'"
"Cuba is a failing nation whose rulers have had a major setback with the loss of support from Venezuela," a White House official told Newsweek.
It marks a serious test on the streets for the lasting rule of the Cuban Communist Party, brought to power in 1959 through a popular revolution led by Fidel Castro.
Fuel scarcities have left much of the nation subject to rolling power outages, which sometimes extend to days in more vulnerable neighbourhoods. There have been at least three nationwide grid failures in the past month.
Crippled transportation networks fail to deliver crucial goods, like medicine, compounding a strain to Cuba’s long-touted health services which emerged from the Covid pandemic.
One doctor running a sparsely supplied community clinic said once-monthly shipments of medicines were now arriving only every 45 days. Roxana Rodriguez told Newsweek she had to resort to pursuing alternative forms of treatment for patients and acknowledged using the black market to fill the gaps where possible.
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Her message to Washington: “The reality is that, with this blockade, those who suffer, those who are bearing the full brunt of the consequences, are the people themselves.”
And while she felt that the government “could do more” to alleviate the situation, she emphasized that if those in the U.S. “were to go directly out to the people" and see the consequences, "they would realize that it really is the blockade” serving as the primary strain on society.
Cuba's touted free schooling system is also beset by growing challenges, with the country’s 100 or so college campuses operating at minimum capacities and instructing students to take up remote learning—when most don’t have internet or regular power at home.
When Newsweek passed by the University of Havana last week, Castro’s alma mater, the grand steps were closed off, the buildings shuttered. Students have staged rare protests there against reduced classes.
In the streets, trash is mounting, particularly in the capital’s poorest neighborhoods, the result of both fuel shortages and the illicit diversion of much of what is provided to garbage trucks being sold to those who can afford it.
As officials scramble to respond to the plight, what appears to worry them most are growing feelings of discontent and apathy among the nation’s roughly 10 million people. More than two million Cubans are estimated to have fled the island since conditions worsened after the pandemic and deepening divisions are emerging among those in the country.
Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío told Newsweek the challenge was compounded by the fact that steering the blame toward Cuban authorities for the country's woes was precisely at the core of U.S. policy, the aim of which he argued was “to make Cuba unsuccessful and unattractive, and sending the message that, ‘If you follow that path, you're going to have pain, you're going to suffer.'"
‘We Are Warriors’
Outside the comparatively luxurious gates of government compounds, the sense of unrest in the capital is palpable. During a visit to one of Central Havana’s poorer neighborhoods, a number of residents were eager to approach Newsweek’s team, defying concerns they may be persecuted for speaking out.
One woman, a middle-aged nurse, said the government had for years failed to adequately address worsening conditions in the neighborhood. “When Fidel was here this didn’t happen,” she said, referencing the late Castro who led as president for nearly 50 years until 2008, handing power to his brother, Raúl, before passing away in 2016.
Yet things have become “much worse" over the past year, and particularly since the oil embargo throttled electric grids and community services, she said. At this point, the woman argued, she would not even mind if Trump made good on his threats to “take” the island nation. She shrugged. “If it happens, then let them come.”
A similar view was expressed by a young woman on her way home after work. She blamed both the government and its socialist ideology for the dire state of affairs and argued that if the U.S. was planning to take over Cuba, it should do so “immediately.”
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An older man listening nearby, however, dismissed such views as “stupid.” He said, “Cubans talk a lot, but when they have to take up a rifle, they will take it” in order to defend against any foreign intervention, though he emphasized that Cuba and the U.S. should rather get along.
A former soldier, he said that the most pressing issue hampering government efforts to resolve the deepening crisis was in his view “the blockade,” the strengthening of which he argued was the latest in a long running series of challenges he was confident Cuba would ultimately overcome.
“I don’t think we’re going to die,” the man said, “because we are warriors.”
‘What We Need Is to Be Left Alone’
Cubans have endured the U.S. economic embargo for more than 60 years and have experienced previous periods of heightened hardship, notably after the early 1990s collapse of the Soviet Union, previously the fellow communist state’s chief benefactor.
Yet the nation emerged from that so-called “Special Period” with world-leading education and health indicators, matching or even outperforming the U.S. in certain areas like infant mortality rates and primary education access.
Promises of free, quality education and health care have served as a cornerstone of the Cuban Communist Party’s lasting leadership, which continues to rule with an iron fist against dissent.
But even with these services now slipping in the face of heightened U.S. pressure, Cubans demonstrate the ability to persevere through challenges others may think impossible. Life carries on in Havana—albeit with some necessary adaptations.
Electric vehicles and e-bikes have joined the classic U.S. cars on the roads in Havana. Solar panels are becoming a household item, with small businesses switching to them when the grid fails.
Dance parties erupt with or without electricity, and music still emanates from radios and live performances across the streets. A sense of community penetrating the political spectrum has proved key, like in the case of the clinic Newsweek visited, which now counts donations from patients as a crucial lifeline amid supplies shortages.
Thus, predictions of Cuba’s collapse today appear premature.
From the position of Díaz-Canel, the first non-Castro to hold the presidency and party leadership since the revolution, the U.S. superpower’s tightening noose around the far smaller island nation speaks to its inability to challenge the Cuban model organically.
“What we need is to be left alone,” Díaz-Canel said. “I always wonder, if the United States believes the Cuban economy is so frail and we are so incapable, if they believe that our model is so bad, why, for 67 years, has the United States persisted in spending millions of dollars from its taxpayers' funds to blockade us, to subvert us, and to attack us? If we are so incapable, why don’t they allow us to fail on our own?”
“Or are they so afraid of the example of what we might do and achieve if we were not under a blockade,” Díaz-Canel said, “taking as a baseline everything we have managed to accomplish even while under the blockade?”
Update 8:40 a.m. ET: This article has been updated to include a quote from Cuban Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernández de Cossío.
Read Newsweek's full interview with the Cuban president here.
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