After more than a half-century of hostilities, the United States and Cuba have taken significant steps in recent years to dramatically alter their relationship in the years ahead. Those efforts are controversial to a number of Americans who oppose engaging the Cuban government.
Prior to the Spanish American War of 1898, Cuba was a Spanish colony with extensive commercial relations with U.S. businesses, particularly with regard to the production of sugar. Following the U.S. victory in the Spanish American War in 1898, Cuba, which is located just 90 miles off the coast of Florida, became a U.S. territory and then gained its independence in 1902.
For more than 50 years following its independence, Cuba was governed by a succession of elected and authoritarian leaders, culminating with rule of Fulgencio Batista, who seized power in a bloodless coup in 1952. Batista ruled as a brutal dictator and was overthrown by resistance groups led by Fidel Castro on January 1, 1959. Castro began his more than 45 years as Cuba’s leader by promising democratic rule, but he quickly began to stifle dissent often by imprisoning or executing opponents. Relations between Castro and the U.S. deteriorated quickly in 1959 and 1960 as he courted the Soviet Union, the U.S.’s adversary in the Cold War, and began confiscating Cuban property owned by U.S. corporations and citizens.
Due to increasing hostilities between the U.S. and Cuba, President Eisenhower severed diplomatic relations with Cuba on
The United States has now gotten rid of it’s relations with Cuba, but the small island wouldn’t be hurt then. The United States had also tried to tear apart Cuba with these plans the Bay of Pigs. As dictator of Cuba, Castro had fought back when America had led some Cuban exiles into Cuba. While the stuff between Cuba, a new Communist nation, and the Capitalist America was happening the Russian president Khrushchev had also been giving missles to Castro since they were both of the same government. “The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 was a direct and dangerous confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War and was the moment when the two superpowers came closest to nuclear conflict. The crisis was unique in a number of ways, featuring calculations and miscalculations as well as direct and secret communications and miscommunications between the two sides. The dramatic crisis was also characterized by the fact that it was primarily played out at the White House and the Kremlin level with relatively little input from the respective bureaucracies typically involved in the foreign policy process.” (The Cuban Missile Crisis, October 1962 - 1961–1968 - Milestones - Office of the Historian.
The embargo is being lifted and Cuba will once again have a good relationship with the United States. The United States has had a rocky relationship with Cuba for the past fifty years. A series of events lead to the destruction of relations between the two nations: the Cuban Revolution, the announcement of the embargo, the Bay of Pigs invasion, and the Cuban Missile Crisis. The Revolution of Cuba in 1959 started the eventual demise of the trust between Cuba and the United States.
In 1959, Cuban leader Fidel Castro seized power over Havana and overthrew the U.S. during the Cold War. Castro then began an alliance with the Soviet Union and proceeded to increase trade with them. After these events, Washington banned exports from the U.S. to Cuba. Restricted were later extended over the whole economy by placing an embargo, which limited Americans travel and the ability to do business with Cuba. These events lead towards restriction between both countries for over 50 years.
Cuba is a nation that formed from a history of colonial and imperial domination. Formal colonial status under Spain ended during the invasion by the United States in 1898, when military and corporate interests made the island a de facto colony of the United States. However, Cuba and the United States have had a long history of both political and military ties; both good and bad. Nevertheless, these ties have played a vital role in the current relationship the United States maintains with Cuba. In the recent years, both countries have continued to work toward a better diplomatic relationship; possibly enhancing the overall success of both Cuba and the United States.
The United States is known for being one of the greatest and strongest countries in the world looking at past events and in this day and age. What might strike some people as shocking is that the U.S. would not be as strong without close ties with other countries or allies. Examples would be France, England, and Canada, plus many more. What people don’t talk about is the U.S.’s rivals or countries that the U.S. has had trouble with in the past leading up to now. One of the most renowned countries is only ninety miles away from the southern tip of Florida and that is Cuba. Cuba is known for the fantastic beaches, some of the most well-known baseball players around, and, of course, Cuban cigars and rum. But, the past with Cuba is not as bright as the U.S. wants it to be because of historical events such as the embargo, the Bay of Pigs, and the Cuban missile crisis during World War II that caused the two countries to separate as allies and close tied nations. Over the past year the U.S. and Cuba have been trying to put the past behind them and have diplomatic and cultural relations once again.
Fidel Castro rose to power in the late 1950s and became dictator of Cuba. Tensions started to grow between America and Cuba when Cuba cut American ties to isolate Cuba so Castro could gain more power. Castro also developed ties with the Soviet Union which was problematic since the United States was engaged in the Cold War with the Soviet Union (History.com). When the presence of Soviet Union missiles in Cuba was announced, a new crisis had taken over. In an attempt to keep the United States
The relatively short distance between Cuba and the U.S. naturally led to a long and involved history of relations between the two nations, but relations between the two nations over the past fifty years have been unhealthy and harmful to both nations. The embargo imposed by the U.S. has only been damaging and unhelpful to the situation. “As a result of the new government’s nationalization policy, American investors suffered major losses and the U.S. retaliated in July 1960 by canceling planned purchases of Cuban sugar” (Crouch 70). This was the first act of neglect toward Cuba that would only quickly progress until all trade and relations were cut off with Cuba.
Cuba’s colorful history can be documented to before the days of the American Revolution in 1776, but today, American policy directly affects many Cubans’ lifestyles because of a nearly 45-year-old trade embargo that has been placed on the island nation. It is crucial to analyze the development of Cuba and its neighboring island nations in order to discern the reasons for Cuba’s current political situation with the United States. The following paper will discuss the events that shaped Cuba and larger Caribbean nations like Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Jamaica; next, a detailed description of Cuba’s turbulent history will help in explaining the Cuban transformation into a
Cuba and the United States are two very different countries. Although they are only nearly 90 miles away from each other it has been over 50 years since both countries have had any real relationship towards each other, other than the hatred that seems to shown by the two countries’ politicians. In October 1960 the United States began to impose its first round of embargoes towards the small island when Cuba decided to nationalize all of the American Oil on its county after the United States without properly compensating the United States. The embargo that was put in place October 1960 limited the on exports to Cuba except for food and medicine. Then in February of 1962 the United States expanded on its embargo from 1960 to include imports as well, but not before John F Kennedy could get his hands on some more of the finest Cigars that Cuba had to offer. There are many reasons for why the United States has placed embargos on the island of Cuba. Some will argue that they should have never placed any embargo against Cuba and some will argue that the embargo should have been lifted a long time ago, but as long as the country remains communist and the Cuban people don’t get an equal opportunity to prosper then lifting or not lifting the embargoes on Cuba will have no real impact on Cuba and its people.
The island of Cuba is located on the northern rim of the Caribbean Sea and was inhabited by Arawak and Ciboney Indians prior to colonization by the Spanish in 1511. This native population, due to the colonization of the Spanish, was ravaged by decease, enslavement and warfare which ultimately caused their extinction. Cuba received little attention throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries like most of Spain’s Caribbean colonies because Spain was concentrating attention on Central and South America, largely ignoring the island colonies.
In the early 1900’s, Cuba was a stomping ground for many of the rich and famous from the United States. Many famous movies stars and wealthy business entrepreneurs spend their vacations there along with a substantial amount of money. Trade and commerce between the United States and Cuba flowed freely and abundantly. Even with the Dictatorship-like regime of Batista, the countries benefited from the economic trade between them. This was all about to come crashing down as revolts against Batista occurred and Fidel Castro came to power within Cuba.
Another consequence of the United States withdrawing her hand from barring the totalitarian grip of Communism was the 1950s insurgency of Communist Fidel Castro in Cuba. In 1959, after years of conflicts with the incumbent
From the time, Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba tensions ran high between the Cuban government and the United States government. Relations between Cuba and the United States grew during Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations. Not as much during the Eisenhower administration as the Kennedy administration did tensions between between the two countries intensify. Kennedy faced many a different situations as President. He faced such situations like the Bay of Pigs Invasion and the Cuban Missile Crisis. Tensions have mounted high for a long time between Cuba and the United States.
The Cuban people have been under the harsh dictatorship of both Felgenico Batista and Fidel Castro. They both had very strict policies and gave the Cuban people limited or no freedom at all. Batista and Castro were similar but yet different. One major difference that they had was that Batista was friendly with the United States and he had respect for American interest. On the other hand Fidel Castro hasn’t been as friendly with the United States, so the U.S has a trade embargo that restricts and American company to do business with Cuba and also U.S citizens are prohibited from traveling to Cuba unless for special circumstances.
Able to weather a variety of political leaders, economic events, and historical eras, the U.S. embargo of Cuba is the longest and harshest embargo by one state against another in modern history. Following Castro’s overthrow of the Batista government in 1959 and threats to incite revolutions elsewhere in Latin America, the Unites State cancelled its trade agreement to buy Cuban sugar. Then, following a series of increasing hostile events, the United States severed diplomatic relations and initiated a full trade embargo in 1962. Trade between the United States and Cuba stopped. Spurred by the collapse of communism more than thirty years later, Congress