By Juan Palop
The US operation against Venezuela and the capture of its president, Nicolás Maduro, has plunged the Cuban Government this Saturday into total political, economic and even military uncertainty.
Caracas was until now Havana’s main political ally, as well as its main economic bastion, due to the vital shipments of Venezuelan crude oil that arrived regularly to the island to feed its energy production, highlight experts consulted by EFE.
The US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, assured this Saturday that the Cuban Government had reasons to be “concerned” after the military operation against Maduro.
“The situation in Venezuela right now is one of uncertainty and that reality also materializes in Cuba,” says the History professor at the University of Havana. Fabio Fernandez.
He points out that “the collapse of Chavismo would deprive the island of its most important regional ally and one of its main economic supports” and warns that “a Cuba without Venezuelan oil only allows us to imagine the deepening of the current crisis.”
In this same line he speaks Michael Bustamanteassociate professor of History at the University of Miami (USA). “In economic terms, the short-term implications for Cuba are very bad, even if a total regime change does not occur in Venezuela,” says Bustamante, who predicts “very clear effects,” especially in the energy field.
To the serious economic crisis in which the island has been mired for more than five years, we must add the energy crisis, which is causing blackouts of 20 or more hours a day on a daily basis in large regions of the country and shows no signs of abating.
And power outages have been the first trigger for protests in recent years in Cuba, from the social outbreak of July 2021 to the recent cacerolazos in Havana and other locations in the fourth quarter of 2025.
Furthermore, according to the New York Times, Cuba was in turn reselling part of the oil that Venezuela supplied to China, so Havana would also be losing a source of foreign currency.
The island, which imports 80% of what it consumes due to the collapse of its agricultural and industrial production, needs foreign currency to import hydrocarbons and food, and its other sources of income – tourism, remittances and medical missions – are in low hours.
Rafael Hernandezpolitical scientist and editor of the magazine Temas, emphasizes that oil is a “strategic input” for Cuba in the current energy crisis, but considers that “what can affect Havana the most” is “the fall of the Chavista Government in Venezuela” (not only the capture of Maduro).
Political effects, military intervention
Fernández details “the political impact derived from the euphoria” that Maduro’s fall may have on “sectors hostile to the Government of Havana within the Trump Administration, Cuban emigration and even in the domestic sphere” of the island.
Bustamante, for his part, recognizes that, in his opinion, “if the economic implications are clear, the political ones are not,” since they depend on the next movements in Caracas, Washington and Havana and the subsequent cross reactions.
In any case, in light of the latest events, Busmente does not rule out US military action in Cuba, although he does not see the argument clear to legitimize it. “That doesn’t mean it’s not possible: anything is now possible at this point.”
Fernández also does not rule out that the island could become a military objective of the Trump Administration. “A scenario potentially opens up in which an aggression against Cuba could take place; an action that would not occur immediately, since it implies the construction of a motive, the preparation of public opinion…” he argues.
Hernández also emphasizes that the arguments with which Venezuela has been accused by the Trump administration in recent months (drug trafficking, mainly) do not work for Cuba, which Washington has denounced for other reasons (crisis, economic mismanagement, human rights violations).
Hernández also highlights one last point about the reaction that could now occur in Havana in this context of growing American aggressiveness.
“A greater probability of US aggression from the Cuban perception is not good news for the climate of openness that the reforms and the political and debate space require in Cuba and that has always been the case. The besieged fortress syndrome does not contribute,” he explains.
