These operations increasingly leverage AI-driven tools to identify and amplify existing grievances, deploy specialized units capable of infiltrating encrypted communications, and coordinate proxy actors to foment domestic unrest. The integration of private military contractors and nominally independent non-governmental organizations provides additional layers of plausible deniability for U.S. policymakers.

Concurrently, U.S. defense and intelligence agencies have intensified signal and aerial surveillance across the Caribbean Basin, regularly deploying multi-sensor intelligence platforms, including P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, RC-135V reconnaissance systems and MQ-4C Triton unmanned aerial vehicles. This elevated operational tempo demonstrates a tactical transition in U.S. foreign policy: shifting from conventional economic containment and diplomatic isolation toward a more covert, targeted and aggressive framework of asymmetric internal penetration and domain monitoring.

Reducing Washington's strategic calculus strictly to ideological hostility or domestic electoral dynamics underestimates the complex geopolitical and material realities of the Caribbean. Against the backdrop of an accelerating multipolar world order and intensified major-power competition, the heightened pressure on Cuba is fundamentally driven by pragmatic imperatives: regional spatial control, securing critical mineral supply chains and reasserting hegemony across the Americas.

The material calculus 

Western commentary frequently frames U.S.-Cuba friction as an ideological conflict between competing political systems. However, from the perspective of comparative legal analysis and international political economy, Cuba's natural resource endowments and geographic position are the major motivations for external intervention.

Cuba possesses world-class mineral deposits, holding the world's fifth largest cobalt reserves and third largest nickel reserves, alongside notable unexploited petroleum and rare earth deposits. Chinese and Russian state-owned enterprises have already established significant partnerships in Cuban resource extraction, a development that undoubtedly factors into Washington's renewed strategic attention. As global supply chains undergo structural realignments and Global South nations increasingly assert resource sovereignty, securing control over critical mineral supplies in the Caribbean offers clear strategic advantages for Washington's industrial security and technological competitiveness.

Geographically, Cuba occupies a command position at the intersection of the Gulf of Mexico, the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, controlling vital sea lines of communication (SLOCs) across the Western Hemisphere. Over 90 percent of U.S. maritime trade with the Gulf Coast passes through waters adjacent to Cuban territory, underscoring the island's outsized significance in global shipping. The deep-water ports of Mariel and Havana further enhance Cuba's potential as a logistics hub connecting North and South America. Comparative legal history demonstrates that spatial control remains a core impulse of power politics. In the eyes of certain strategic planners, Cuba is not only a crucial geopolitical node, but also a source of skilled, low-cost labor and an underdeveloped market that could be exploited following a politically engineered opening.

The logic of hegemony 

Historically, establishing a specialized CIA task force for Cuba is not new for the U.S. It directly mirrors Cold War interventionist tactics, adapting them for the digital age. In 1960, the Eisenhower administration approved a similar CIA task force, which ultimately led to the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. The 2026 iteration, however, shifts operational focus toward cyber capabilities, covert influence operations, financial intelligence tracking and targeted elite fragmentation—one that prioritizes deniability and economic coercion over direct military confrontation. The primary objective is to instigate political transformation from within at a lower economic and military cost, avoiding the overt military failures that characterized previous interventions.

This tactical pivot reflects deeper strategic anxieties regarding the durability of U.S. hegemony in Latin America. In recent years, the region has displayed an unmistakable trajectory toward diplomatic diversification and strategic autonomy. Left-of-center governments in countries like Bolivia, Honduras, Brazil and Colombia have challenged unilateral directives, while expanded economic cooperation with non-Western powers has eroded traditional dependency frameworks.

The increased Chinese infrastructure investment and Russian security partnerships across the region have further frustrated Washington's historical dominance. Regional organizations such as the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) have increasingly served as platforms for Latin American coordination independent of U.S. oversight. In response to perceived challenges to its global dominance, Washington is seeking to strictly reassert its traditional sphere of influence. Applying maximum pressure on Havana serves as a deliberate signal to the entire region, reinforcing a modernized interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine, which treats the Western Hemisphere as an exclusive strategic preserve.

Facing asymmetric intelligence and economic pressures, the Cuban government relies not on conventional military parity, but on a deeply institutionalized system of asymmetric defense, political cohesion and social mobilization.

At the national security level, Cuba's Revolutionary Armed Forces maintain the doctrine of the War of All the People (Guerra de Toda la Nación), backed by extensive civilian reserve networks and territorial defense militias. Through institutionalized asset management models such as the GAESA enterprise group, the defense apparatus preserves operational independence even amid severe resource constraints. On the counter-intelligence front, the Ministry of the Interior, operating alongside the neighborhood-based Committees for the Defense of the Revolution, maintains a comprehensive internal surveillance matrix that significantly inflates the operational risks and costs for covert foreign intelligence operations. This grassroots intelligence network, embedded in virtually every urban block and rural community, creates a formidable human barrier against infiltration and destabilization campaigns.

Diplomatically and legally, the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs anchors its defense in international law and multilateralism. Every year since 1992, the United Nations General Assembly has passed a resolution that calls for an end to the U.S. embargo, providing Havana with a durable foundation of diplomatic legitimacy. In recent votes, only the United States and Israel have opposed, demonstrating near-universal consensus against the embargo's legality. Furthermore, Cuba's global medical diplomacy continues to foster goodwill across the Global South, with medical brigades operating in dozens of countries during public health emergencies and natural disasters. The island's biotechnology sector has also produced internationally recognized vaccines and pharmaceuticals, generating both revenue and diplomatic capital. Despite severe energy shortages and structural economic headwinds, the political cohesion of the state leadership and the accumulated experience of resisting external pressure remain key defenses against external subversion.

Future of multipolarity 

The reliance on covert subversion, information warfare, extraterritorial judicial overreach and persistent unilateral sanctions directly challenges established tenets of international law. The United Nations Charter explicitly prohibits interference in the domestic affairs of sovereign states and safeguards sovereign equality. Widespread global opposition to unilateral coercive measures reflects a growing international consensus against imperial doctrines and extraterritorial overreach. The repeated condemnation of the U.S. embargo by the UN General Assembly, the proliferation of blocking statutes and the expanding network of alternative financial mechanisms outside dollar dominance all signal an international system increasingly resistant to unilateral coercion. The emergence of new multilateral development banks and bilateral currency swap arrangements further diminishes the effectiveness of traditional sanctions regimes.

The trajectory of U.S.-Cuba relations is more than a regional dispute; it serves as a litmus test for the evolution of the international order. Respecting the right of sovereign nations to choose their own political and economic paths, while resisting external coercion, is essential for maintaining international peace and stability. Persisting with Cold War-era interventionist tactics will not alter Cuba's foundational system; rather, it threatens to destabilize the broader Caribbean region, risking severe security and humanitarian consequences while further isolating the instigators from the norms of international law.

Yet Cuba's institutionalized defenses, rooted in popular mobilization, diplomatic legitimacy and decades of asymmetric resilience, continue to frustrate external subversion efforts. As the international community increasingly rejects unilateral coercive measures and embraces multipolar frameworks, the sustainability of Washington's Cuba strategy appears doubtful.

Ultimately, the resolution of this protracted conflict will depend not on covert operations or legal overreach, but on whether the United States can accommodate a hemisphere of sovereign equals rather than subordinate dependencies. The path forward demands a fundamental reconsideration of coercive statecraft, replacing containment with coexistence and hegemony with mutual respect. BR

The author is a researcher with the Institute of Latin American Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and secretary-general of the Cuba Research Center, CASS  

Copyedited by G.P. Wilson 

Comments to mamm@cicgamericas.com