Trump needs to free the Cuban people |
Trump needs to free the Cuban people
With friends like Fidel Castro and his political successors, ordinary Canadians and Cubans need no enemies;
Hymie Rubenstein ——Bio and Archives--February 21, 2026
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The many critics of America’s treatment of Cuba since the successful 1959 revolution led by Fidel Castro turned that country into a Soviet-style Marxist “paradise” have chronically failed to address the horrific conditions under which ordinary Cubans have had to live for the past 67 years.
Rarely mentioned, for example, is that this revolution has forced at least one million Cubans, one-tenth of the island’s population, to flee their beloved homeland because of economic strangulation and political oppression.
Those left behind have always suffered from food shortages and rationing, poverty level incomes, the arbitrary confiscation of their property, the inability to form opposition political parties, poor medical treatment, constant surveillance, and many other adversities, none of which have anything to do with the long-standing American trade embargo for the simple reason that Cuba has always had trade and diplomatic access to most countries of the world, including Canada. Many of these countries, especially Russia, have provided substantial aid to the country during periods of extreme, but self-imposed, economic deprivation.
Currently, all Donald Trump wants is to give freedom and dignity to ordinary Cubans, a desire shared by most exiles and their descendants living in the diaspora.
Caribbean and other supporters of the current Cuban regime care not a twit about the desire of most Cubans at home and abroad for social, economic, and political emancipation. Instead, they constantly focus mainly on the military and humanitarian aid Cuba has given to other countries over the decades, ignoring the fact that this support has come on the back of the hard-working efforts of the Cuban people themselves.
These efforts even include the rock bottom wages paid to those physicians forcibly dispatched to Third World countries across the globe, most of their gross earnings repatriated to the Cuban regime, which uses these “profits” to exploit their very own people further.
Yes, many pundits are correct when they assert that the world has changed and is changing for the worse, but they unthinkingly and zealously ignore the worst change for Cuba came in 1959 when an arguably corrupt Batista government was replaced by an even more corrupt one, a communist reign of terror that the Cuban people continue to suffer under.
Despite contrary evidence, many commentators across the globe, including politicians, community activists, and the general public, continue to blame Cuba’s past and present economic adversities, such as low wages, constant hunger, and poor housing, on the United States economic embargo, often called “el bloqueo” (the blockade) by Cubans.
Though this trade blockade consists of a comprehensive set of economic, commercial, and financial sanctions first established in the early 1960s, this has not prevented Cuba from trading with other countries, as already mentioned.
The only current constraints are the loss of most aid and other concessions from its traditional patron, Russia, and the fact that post-revolutionary Cuba has always been on the brink of economic collapse because of destructive collectivistic economic policies, incompetent political administration, and the migration of its best, brightest, and most productive citizens.
Still, it is the longest-standing trade embargo in modern history, so continues to draw much international attention, even though most of its causes are rarely mentioned or downplayed by its detractors.
The initial trigger for the blockade was the illegal nationalization of U.S. property in 1960, featuring the Cuban government’s seizure of American-owned assets. After the 1959 revolution, Fidel Castro nationalized oil refineries, sugar mills, and utilities — most without a cent of compensation to their mainly American owners.
Only time will tell whether this pressure will prompt the people of Cuba to rise up and take back their country from its oppressive and corrupt Marxist leaders
This seizure remains a legal hurdle to this day: the U.S. Department of State notes that roughly US$7 billion to US$8 billion in proven claims for stolen property must be resolved before the embargo can be fully lifted.
A second reason for the blockade was a reaction to the Cold War, with the U.S. aiming to isolate the Castro regime to prevent the spread of Soviet influence, military power, and communism in the Western Hemisphere.
Cuba began purchasing Soviet oil and armaments in 1960. In 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis, based on the discovery of secret Soviet nuclear missiles on an island a mere 90 miles across the Florida Straits, prompted President John F. Kennedy to expand the partial trade ban into a full embargo to reduce the threat to American security.
In recent decades, the justification for the blockade shifted toward forcing political change to free the Cuban people from the oppressive yoke of communism. Laws like the Cuban Democracy Act (1992) and the Helms-Burton Act (1996) codified the embargo, stipulating that it can only be lifted if Cuba meets specific conditions, such as legalizing all political activity and holding free elections; releasing political prisoners; and respecting freedom of the press and labour unions.
Canadian supporters of the current Cuban political system should tell us whether they would support such restrictions and oppressive conditions in our own homeland.
The U.S. has also designated Cuba as a state sponsor of global terrorism multiple times (1982–2015, and again from 2021 to the present).
As far as immediate justifications for the embargo, reasons activist critics are now preoccupied with, are the American government's concerns about Cuba’s continued embrace of the current regime in Venezuela, a thoroughly corrupt government that has stolen two elections in a row, is currently harbouring U.S. fugitives, and has close ties to Russia, China, Iran and other bad actors.
Political considerations, particularly in Florida, also continue to play a significant role in maintaining the blockade. The large and influential Cuban-American constituency often supports a hardline stance to punish the Cuban government, a regime that made life in their homeland intolerable. This makes any attempt to lift the embargo a sensitive political issue for both the Democrat and Republican parties.
Fast forward to February 2026: the embargo is now a “total pressure” policy under the second Trump administration, which has recently implemented an oil blockade to isolate further the island’s tourism and energy sectors.
Only time will tell whether this pressure will prompt the people of Cuba to rise up and take back their country from its oppressive and corrupt Marxist leaders.
In the meantime, it needs to be noted that many other Caribbean islands, Cuba’s tourism sector has enjoyed a reputation as an “economic locomotive” — a term used by authorities who saw it as the lifeblood of the country’s economy.
International visitor numbers down by more than 50 per cent between 2018 and 2024
This was not always the case.
Before the 1959 Cuban Revolution, Cuba’s tourism industry was largely privatized, much of it owned and exploited by the Batista-supported American mafia as a gangster’s paradise. Once the Castro-led revolution overthrew the Batista regime, the sector was put on hold largely because of its previous mafia ties.
But when the Soviet Union imploded in the 1980s, the Cuban government decided that sun, surf, and sand made good economic sense and that the tourist industry should be revived.
By the 2000s, Castro’s regime began centralizing more parts of the Cuban economy. This restructuring included putting its tourism industry under the mandate of GAESA, a military-run conglomerate that generates more than a third of Cuba’s GDP.
Meanwhile, after former U.S. President Barack Obama normalized relations with the Castro government in 2015, an uptick in American visitors led to a tourism boom.
At its pre-pandemic peak, the sector accounted for 10 per cent of the country’s overall GDP: it had its best year for overnight stays in 2017, generating $3.3 billion U.S. for the country’s economy.
Around that time, there were roughly 100,000 to 120,000 direct jobs in Cuban tourism, and close to 500,000 workers were directly and indirectly linked to tourism.
But the thaw in U.S.-Cuba relations slowed when the first Trump administration imposed restrictions on travel to Cuba in 2019, just months before the COVID-19 pandemic ground global tourism to a halt. A few years later, the war in Ukraine slowed tourism from Russia.
Now, Cuba’s chance of surviving without a functioning tourism industry is “very unlikely,” largely because the sector, through the cash spent at its hotels, resorts and restaurants, is a major source of liquidity for a country already in such financial dire straits that it can be called economically bankrupt.
In particular, the country’s economy is about 15 per cent smaller now than it was during the tourism sector’s 2018 peak, according to Ricardo Torres, a Cuban economist and research fellow at American University in Washington, D.C.
“It’s a disaster,” Torres told CBC News, noting that Cubans have become increasingly frustrated with what they view as the government’s mismanagement of the tourism industry.
The Cuban government invested heavily in the industry during Joe Biden’s administration, hoping that if the former U.S. president approached Cuba with the same warmth that Obama had, it would lead to a post-COVID recovery in tourism. That never happened.
Rather than invest in the country’s infrastructure, Torres says the government poured billions into a dying industry.
U.S. government’s squeeze on Cuba’s oil supply has pushed the nation’s most crucial industry closer to its breaking point
“I think that’s what Cubans resent,” he said. “They had enough [time] to change course, and they didn’t. And now we are paying the price — because tourism is not working, but neither is any other part of the economy.”
During protests that have flared up across the country since 2021, some of Havana’s most luxurious hotels have become gleaming symbols of inequality, as Cuba’s electrical grid has continuously flatlined and humanitarian conditions have deteriorated.
The country’s other strategic sectors, meanwhile, have been pushed to “the point of checkmate,” wrote Miami-based market expert Emilio Morales in a 2024 report. Those sectors include electrical energy generation, transportation, health, agriculture, and drinking water supply. In the same report, Morales estimated that 10,000 tourism workers have left the country.
“Any Cuban person who is short of medicine, who is cooking with wood or coal, must be very frustrated at seeing these empty hotels, at seeing the possibility of tourism decreasing and therefore the economic situation getting more dire,” said one commentator. “The level of sub-social frustration — it is there in Cuba and will continue to grow.”
But the industry has been in decline since its 2018 peak, and the U.S. government’s squeeze on Cuba’s oil supply has pushed the nation’s most crucial industry closer to its breaking point.
The Trump administration has even threatened to impose tariffs on countries that supply fuel to Cuba — part of an effort to strangle the communist-run country after the fall of its close ally and main energy supplier, Venezuela, in January.
As a result, Canadian, Russian, and European airlines have suspended flights, and resorts have shuttered, staunching the flow of international visitors.
Without international tourism, Cuba might not survive. In 2024, the country had 2.2 million visitors, down more than 50 per cent from the 4.7 million tourists it welcomed in 2018.
Some experts say Cuba now faces its worst economic crisis since the aftermath of the 1962 Missile Crisis, and the collapse of its tourism industry could be the economy’s death knell.
The most recent sign of this collapse is the February 18 announcement by Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs advising Canadians to avoid non-essential travel to Cuba due to worsening shortages of fuel, electricity, and necessities.
These shortages can affect resort services and lead to public disorder and power outages, it said.
According to Blacklock’s Reporter, diplomats updated a federal travel advisory, warning that conditions were so poor that drivers were fighting in gas station lineups.
“All Canadian airlines have suspended service to Cuba until further notice,” said the travel advisory. “Commercial flights remain available through international airlines. However, they may become limited on short notice.”
Canadian diplomats, as late as 2021, praised the ruling Communist Party for embracing “social rights,” mindlessly ignoring the absence of basic human rights
These cancellations are a critically important issue because Canada is by far the largest source of tourists to Cuba, consistently ranking as the top market with over 750,000 visitors in 2025, representing a massive share of total international arrivals. Following Canada, the top source markets include Cuban expatriates living abroad (primarily from the U.S.), Russia, the United States, and European nations such as Spain, Germany, and France.
“Avoid non-essential travel to Cuba due to worsening shortages of fuel, electricity and basic necessities including food, water and medicine,” said the notice Cuba Travel Advice. “These shortages can also affect services at resorts. Fuel availability has decreased, is difficult to predict and may disrupt ground transportation.”
“Traveling across the island is extremely challenging,” said Travel Advice. “Public transportation services, including taxis, are often disrupted, leaving tourists with few options to travel. Some travellers have been temporarily stranded with a rental car. There are often long lineups at gas stations that have led to altercations.”
The foreign affairs department said Canadians who ignored the advisory should beware of public disorder in Cuba – “Even peaceful demonstrations can turn violent,” it said – and expect day-long blackouts. “To reduce pressure on the electric network, Cuba schedules long daily power cuts,” wrote diplomats. “Sometimes unexpected nationwide power outages occur and can last more than 24 hours.”
Luxury resorts were not immune, the notice said. “Many large hotels and resorts use generators during power outages,” it said. “However, fuel shortages may impact generator use and availability of various services, activities and utilities such as food.”
“Cuba faces chronic and severe shortages of basic necessities including food, bottled water, public water supply, medication, fuel and hard currency,” said Travel Advice. “Resorts can be affected by shortages.”
The department did not indicate how many Canadians were now in Cuba, excluding Embassy staff.
Canadian diplomats, as late as 2021, praised the ruling Communist Party for embracing “social rights,” mindlessly ignoring the absence of basic human rights such as peaceful political protests, free and fair elections between competing political parties, freedom of speech, and the formation of independent labour unions.
These are highly cherished human rights in Canada, as in countless countries around the world.
Still, these constraints on basic human rights did nothing to prevent Canada from stating that it “recognizes Cuba’s strong commitment to economic and social rights, particularly in the areas of education and health,” according to a March 19, 2021, briefing note titled “Canada-Cuba Relations.”
The note followed a 2016 visit by then-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who praised Fidel Castro as “a legendary revolutionary and orator” with “significant improvements to the education and health care of his island nation,” parroting the views of his father, Pierre Elliot Trudeau, a former Canadian Prime Minister who harboured an intense affection for the country’s long-serving dictator.
“While a controversial figure, both Mr. Castro’s supporters and detractors recognized his tremendous dedication and love for the Cuban people who had a deep and lasting affection for ‘el Comandante,’” said Justin Trudeau. “I know my father was very proud to call him a friend.”
With friends like Fidel Castro and his political successors, ordinary Canadians and Cubans need no enemies.
Hymie Rubenstein, a retired professor of anthropology at the University of Manitoba, is editor of REAL Indigenous Report.
Hymie Rubenstein, a retired professor of anthropology at the University of Manitoba, is editor of —REAL Indigenous Report.
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