Posted on 05/20/2026 1:36:59 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The United States on Wednesday charged former Cuban President Raúl Castro over the 1996 shootdown of two small aircraft, marking the first time a senior figure from the communist regime has been accused before the courts of its neighboring enemy. Castro is accused of murder, conspiracy to kill U.S. citizens, and destruction of aircraft in connection with the deaths of four people.
The charges represent a new escalation in Washington’s intense pressure campaign against the communist island, which has been under a U.S. embargo since 1962 and is now devastated by a severe economic crisis. Raúl Castro, now 94, was Cuba’s defense minister in 1996.
“This is a political action, with no legal foundation, whose only purpose is to add to the file they are fabricating to justify the madness of a military aggression against Cuba,” Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel wrote on X.
(Excerpt) Read more at ticotimes.net ...
Sounds like Miguel is getting a bit nervous.
Time to break out the discombobulater rifles and go Maduro the guy.
Is this the event where they were trying to sneak in an got shot down?
So the guy who was running Cuba did something to people trying to get into Cuba to do things against his country?
And we are charging him from a distance.
I don’t like Cuba, but this seems like a stretch.
Prelude to war?
Part of the pretext to the invasion of Venezuela was the arrest of Nicolás Maduro.
Charge Castro with murder so we can invade Cuba to effect his arrest and we can effect regime change.
Didn’t Marco Rubio meet with Raúl Castro in Cuba just last week? Maybe he was giving him a friendly heads-up. “Better pack an overnight bag, amigo.” Or am I misremembering?
Marco met with Fidel’s grandson iirc, don’t know about with brother Raul
From an apnews.com article today:
Asked what will happen next for Cuba, President Donald Trump said, “We’re going to see.” He added that the U.S. is ready to provide humanitarian assistance to a “failing nation.”
To be clear, it is U.S. policy that has exacerbated the "failing."
Once the U.S. is in Cuba, we will rebuild their electrical grid, among other things, and modernize infrastructure.
In exchange the U.S. will have access to Cuba's substantial critical mineral reserves.
https://mexicobusiness.news/mining/news/us-sanctions-force-sherritt-out-cuba
US Sanctions Force Sherritt Out of Cuba
05/11/2026
Sherritt International's suspension of its Cuba joint venture operations, driven by a May 1 US executive order expanding sanctions to foreign actors in Cuba's mining, energy and financial sectors, signals tightening geopolitical constraints on critical mineral supply chains relevant to Mexico's position as a regional trade hub. The move exposes how US secondary sanctions targeting nickel and cobalt operations can abruptly disrupt North American processing supply chains, as seen with Sherritt's Fort Saskatchewan refinery facing feedstock depletion by mid-June. Mexican mining and energy firms with exposure to US-sanctioned jurisdictions or commodity flows through Cuba face heightened compliance and operational risks.
Sherritt International suspended its direct participation in Cuban joint venture operations effective immediately on May 7, sending shares down as much as 30% in Toronto trading, as the company warned it could face US sanctions at any moment.
...
The announcement followed a May 1 executive order signed by President Donald Trump that expanded US sanctions to target foreign actors operating in Cuba's metals and mining, energy, defense, financial services and security sectors. Trump described Cuba as continuing to represent "an extraordinary threat" to US national security.
The new measures also target foreign banks that collaborate with the Cuban government, as well as individuals and entities involved in the energy and mining sectors.
...
Sherritt's retreat is the latest example of how US geopolitical strategy is reshaping access to critical minerals in Latin America. Cuba's nickel and cobalt resources, key inputs for electric vehicle batteries and other industrial applications, have drawn increasing attention as governments and investors focus on who controls critical mineral supply chains.
The escalation against Cuba follows a broader pattern in the Trump administration's approach to the region, which has used tariffs, sanctions and diplomatic pressure to limit the influence of governments it considers adversarial. Venezuela's oil cutoff to Cuba and the subsequent expansion of sanctions into the mining sector represent a coordinated effort to isolate Havana economically.
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