The Latin American Report # 713: Russian tanker Anatoly Kolodkin approaches Cuba

After more than three months without receiving crude oil from abroad, the Russian tanker Anatoly Kolodkin is expected to arrive in Cuba carrying around 740,000 barrels of Urals crude. This will not make a major difference in the long run. In other words, it will not pull the Island out of the severe crisis it is facing—largely the result of the Trump administration’s decision to intensify the enforcement of a longstanding U.S. policy of economic aggression.

However, it will undoubtedly help ease the situation and relieve— for a while—the pressure on authorities facing the prospect of a total collapse. Perhaps indirectly referring to the issue, Marco Rubio said last Friday that there was no naval blockade against Cuba, and that the country was not receiving fuel because it was not paying for it. A deeply cynical statement from the head of Foggy Bottom, because, for instance, at the end of January, the Trump administration threatened to impose tariffs on countries supplying Cuba with crude.

Even before that, unofficially, they had pressured Mexico into halting its shipments—and for now, that pressure continues. One question that remains in the air is whether there was any coordination between Moscow and Washington to at least allow the Anatoly Kolodkin to reach a Cuban port. It has been reported that Cuba asked the Vatican to help moderate Washington’s approach.

This year, about 30,000 barrels of U.S.-origin petroleum products have entered the country, but these shipments are licensed by the U.S. Commerce Department and are directed exclusively to the private sector. The Russian crude carried by the Kolodkin, on the other hand, can be refined and redirected toward highly sensitive national needs. The government will have to carefully ration and closely monitor this stock.

Is a U.S. military operation in Cuba inevitable?

I would not dare to categorically say yes, but I believe that never in the entire history of the Cuban Revolution—since the Missile Crisis—has the probability been higher than it is right now. It is more likely than not. The Trump administration appears to be interpreting the world through a realist paradigm, that is, as a wild and lawless environment where “might makes right.” In this sense, the quagmire they are now facing in Tehran may be acting as a harsh lesson, tempering their arrogance and swagger and forcing them to recalibrate their next steps, which, invariably, lead to Cuba. The pattern is clear: the owner of the Resolute Desk sets his sights on a target, and something (consequential) happens there.

It has been said that the current approach of the Trump administration is not regime change, but rather ensuring that those regimes it considers—or portrays as—threats to its national security submit to its humiliating, sovereignty-eroding control. The issue here is that the Cuban case is unique within U.S. policy. Something like what has happened in Caracas is simply inconceivable for the Florida-based Cuban exile community and its representatives in Washington, including the Secretary of State. (Although the latter has already shown that, to remain at Foggy Bottom and perhaps position himself for a 2028 presidential run, he can quite easily abandon any of the principles he upheld throughout his political career up until January 2025.)

What hardliners in Miami want is the complete dismantling of the political system—no intermediate steps, no half measures. If Havana were on Mars, and if the past 67 years were not such a lodged thorn for them and for U.S. power itself, moving toward a Vietnam-style model—characterized by the Communist Party retaining political control alongside a largely market-oriented economy—would be enough. (I believe we are compelled to take that step, or that it should have been taken earlier in a more organic manner, given the dynamics of this world system (dis)order, which is particularly unforgiving toward projects like Cuba’s.)

This hypothetical shift toward an “Asian-style socialism,” which President Miguel Díaz-Canel has projected explicitly in a recent interview with La Jornada, could be defended as a move shaped by years of uneven and dialectical zigzagging between planning and the market. While it is natural that it would be linked to Trump’s policy of strangulation—leading some to argue that Cuba has conceded—, this, together with the mass release of allegedly political prisoners, is a necessary development. The red line lies in any change, however minimal, regarding the organization of the state, excluding here the governance system directly related to the economy. If Trump ultimately decides to carry out a military operation, it remains to be seen what such a move would actually entail.

Source for the cover image.