> Nobody is sending missiles to Cuba anymore.

Or are they?

https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/12/americas/russian-navy-cuba-in...

Still no. Just a visit, doesn't look like Cuba has any wish to become Russia's military fortress. From Russia side all decisions are made by a single person who is not thinking big. Cuba would be quite expensive. Ukraine is more then enough for Putin, unlikely he wants a new 'adventure'.

> Ukraine is more then enough for Putin

What about propaganda where he will capture the whole EU after Ukraine?

> propaganda

You mean his own words? https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/putin-ally-warns-enemy-...

Medvedev's not Putin, he's Putin's useful idiot, a provocateur, west's bogeyman.

The only time he makes the news in the west is when he mentions nuking some random European country, which for the record happens quite frequently.

You should never take anything he says seriously.

How is it useful to provoke your much stronger opponent when your own country has the GDP of Greece?

Because he's not targeting the west, he's targeting semi-literate part of Russian population. He isn't giving statements like that on CNN, he's giving statements like that on TV programs that no educated person watches.

He's there to blow things out of proportion locally, he just happens to be translated from time to time for clicks. There's no significance to his words. He doesn't speak on behalf of Putin, he's not there to leak some super-secret internal plans for the future, he's just there to yap about how Russia can totally take over the entire Europe.

education has nothing to do with this, an average university professor in Russia(or for a matter of fact in the west too) is a radical supporter of the mainstream media

there is no point in comparing gdps here, what's important is what is the capability of war industry and armies are, and at the moment we can see that industries are not that far off, add nuclear weapons to the picture, and its draw, just as it was in the cold war.

The overall GDP tells you what capabilities exist in total. Life of Russians is significantly more impacted in post because they are redirecting a much larger part of their economy. Let's also not forget that the cold war was with the Soviet Union and not just Russia.

GDP is directly and strongly correlated to military industrial capability for sustaining a meaningful war effort. Modern history has shown this time and time again in many wars where enemies seriously applied themselves to pushing onward (I say this to exclude things like the Vietnam War, in which the U.S could have crushed the North but didn't have the political or social will do push it that far). Aside from its nuclear arsenal, Russia is economically and in terms of sustained war production no match for the NATO Alliance, even without the U.S. With U.S support, there's no chance. Putin himself even recently stated this, calling the idea of attacking NATO insane and specifically referencing his country's economic strength vs. that of NATO and the U.S.

Russia is just barely sustaining its war with Ukraine and the production capacity behind restocking destroyed and lost supplies. Never mind a war with NATO, unless they're willing to use nukes and risk utterly destroying themselves, and I don't quite think Putin is that insane. Even if he is, I don't think those surrounding him are, and their sycophancy would rapidly evaporate if faced with a real, immediate threat of their boss unleashing something that makes their decades of hard-stolen self-enrichment become irrelevant.

Medvedev being a puppet/idiot etc solidifies the fact that everything he says comes directly from his boss. He wouldn't say it otherwise.

China is Cuba's main commercial partner but their relationship is purely commercial. A military cooperation has surely not even crossed their minds.

E.g. https://features.csis.org/hiddenreach/china-cuba-spy-sigint/

Spy stations aren't at all close to the level of provocation that missile launcher would be - the former have been around for decades, the latter nearly caused WWIII about 62 years ago.

Absolutely, but they also represent more than just commercial cooperation.

It's not just the President. Some aspects of US-Cuban relations are written into federal law and would take an Act of Congress to change.

As a practical matter, Americans can travel to Cuba without much trouble. Several of my friends have gone.

American yes but not if you are from another country and need to go the US…

The people who really care are Cuban exiles around Miami.

When Florida was a swing state, that was enough to make every presidential candidate be pro embargo.

Now that Florida is a red state, it might be different.

The Cuban population of Miami is heavily republican and pro-embargo. This is why Obama got rid of it and Trump reinstated it.

What I can't understand is WHY are the people who escaped for a better life, pro embargo... What, 70 years later? Seems like it's only being highly effective at hurting the general population

My father migrated from Cuba in the 60's and anytime I asked him whether it was worth me visiting he promptly said

"No, absolutely not. Don't even waste your time considering it. Castro ruined it and it will never be the same".

I think the moral is that for many Cubans the embargo isn't against the people, it's against the Cuban government, and they genuinely hate the government with every fiber of their existence. They hate what Castro took from them and have no dissolutions that letting up the embargo would strengthen that governments rule while only providing minuscule benefits to the people. Until the government regime changes in Cuba, any pressure we can apply is worth it.

Just to clarify, you are upholding your father's political retribution despite being born elsewhere and (presumably) never visiting? I'm genuinely curious.

What a strange question.

It was a traumatic event in his father’s life. There is no illogic in despising the people and organizations that brought about that misery on his father.

The answer to this question is so obvious I have trouble believing you are asking in good faith.

No, I'm genuinely curious.

The handful of Cubans I've known over the years expressed the same sentiment: Intense hatred for Castro and the Cuban government.

the point is that if it's not a swing state politicians don't care about the state wants. so the embargo might fall to the sidelines

Cuban exiles are about 50/50 on embargo. It’s been around a while, and obviously isn’t changing the regime. Making people poor doesn’t bring democracy.

I think the major problem with Cuba is their relationship with Russia.

> most of the rest of the world has fine relations with Cuba

Most of the rest of the world didn't get Soviet nuclear missiles pointed at them by Cuba.

This is 60 years ago... In that same timeframe the EU was formed and grown to 26 nations including roughly 10 that pointed nuclear missiles at each other one time.

What time was that? There aren't even ten nations in the EU with nuclear weapons.

Just like Cuba didn't really itself point missiles towards the US (it was the soviets), the Warsaw pact nations inside current EU were used as Soviet proxies too.

Ok, I still don't get it then. The Warsaw pact nations were not planning on using their nukes on other European nations with nuclear weapons, to avoid getting nuked themselves. This is documented in the (formerly) secret war plans that were released by the Czech republic.

Not only did Cuba allow for missiles to be there, Castro specifically argued to use them.

https://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/23/opinion/castro-wanted-a-n...

You know that this was a response for american missiles being placed on Turkey, right? By your comment, I assume that you also agree with Russia, when they criticize NATO expansion around their borders, right?

By your comment, I assume that you don't see a difference between "not having a commercial relationship with a country" and "invading and annexing a country".

Cuba was being invaded at that time (Bay of Pigs Invasion, later there was also discussion about a false flag attack to kill people, blame Cuba and then justify an invasion). From the point of view of Cuba, the Russian missiles were a way to ensure that other invasions would not happen again. If the missile crises were not solved, then the conflict would escalate to a war, but fortunately, it did not happen.

You have shifted to the justification for the threat, which is not what we are talking about.

Castro not only accepted the missiles, he demanded they be used: https://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/23/opinion/castro-wanted-a-n...

If you are arguing this is normal or in some way explainable, I don't know what to tell you. There is ample reason why relations aren't good and you cannot exclusively blame others (the US) for it.

Everyone in europe had to be fine with that for the whole cold war. Never understood the american hysterics during the cuban missile crisis. Like the END wasnt real before and after.Manifest destiny for exceptional Hipocrasy.