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The Real Reason The US Is Against The Entire World On Cuba

The entire world just voted to end the 60-year blockade against Cuba…except for two countries. Can you guess which ones? (Luxembourg was neither of them.) I take you back to September 1961. The U.S. was a younger, naive nation. We drove around with children in our laps because the seatbelt law was still years away. And the top song of the day was Barry Mann’s “Who put the bomp into bomp bah bomp bah bomp?” (Turns out it was Henry Kissinger. He was a childlike 73 years old back then, and he was actually into “bomping” before he was into bombing.) In 1961 the United States began a massive embargo against the island country of Cuba. This was just a few months after the Bay of Pigs invasion, in which the U.S. tried to retake Cuba from the communist revolutionaries who had wrested it away from the American-backed capitalist oligarchs.

World Calls For End To US Blockade On Cuba For 30th Time

The United Nations General Assembly has called for an end to the long-standing and genocidal U.S. blockade on Cuba for the 30th consecutive time, in a 185 to 2 vote, with 2 abstentions. The United States was joined by Israel in voting against, while Brazil and Ukraine abstained. The draft resolution on the ‘Necessity of ending the economic, commercial and financial embargo imposed by the United States of America against Cuba’ was debated on Tuesday, November 2nd and Wednesday the 3rd, during which it was made clear that the United States remains isolated in pursuing its illegal blockade policy against Cuba. On Tuesday, the Assembly heard from groups and organizations which pronounced themselves in favor of the draft resolution: ASEAN, SICA, CELAC, G77 + China, CARICOM, the Organization for Islamic Cooperation, Group of Friends in Defense of the UN Charter and Non-Aligned Movement and the African Group.

US Again Isolated On UN Vote Against Its Cuba Blockade

For the 30th consecutive United Nations vote, the US again lost. A landslide margin of 185 to 2 condemned its blockade of Cuba on November 3. Only the apartheid state of Israel voted with the US, while Brazil and Ukraine abstained. Since 1960, the bipartisan policy of the US has been to overthrow the Cuban Revolution by fomenting “disenchantment and disaffection based on economic dissatisfaction and hardship.” According to the US State Department, punitive economic measures are imposed to deny “money and supplies to Cuba, to decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation, and the overthrow of [the] government.” The US blockade daily costs Cuba $15 million; $6.3 billion since Biden took office. Cuba’s income for the first quarter of 2022 exceeded $493 million, but imports of goods amounted to more than $2 billion.

Demonstrations Across The Country Call For End To Blockade On Cuba

Large demonstrations on the east and west coasts of the US took place yesterday calling for the end of the Blockade of Cuba as the annual vote in the General Assembly of the UN approaches this week. This will mark the 30th occasion when the overwhelming majority of countries of the world will stand up together in solidarity with the people of Cuba in their defiant struggle and dignified struggle against US imperialism. In New York over 200 people marched from Times Square, across busy 42nd Street, to the US-UN office on 1st Avenue demanding that Cuba be taken off Washington’s list of state sponsors of terrorism, a measure designed to suffocate every aspect of Cuba’s ability to access the world market, to end all trade and travel restrictions and to end the over 62-year-old illegal blockade of the island. 

Ukraine: Will US Back Off As Russia Did On Cuba?

Sixty years ago today (October 28) the U.S. and Russia stepped back from the brink of nuclear war by making a deal. Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev would yield to President John F. Kennedy’s demand that Soviet missiles be removed from Cuba; Kennedy pledged not to invade. There is an instructive analogy with Ukraine today. Soviet documents that were revealed after the USSR imploded show how this all went down – and how we all would have "gone down," literally, were it not for the statesmanlike behavior of both leaders and their acute realization of the stakes involved. Some of what I include below is drawn from a book by Aleksandr Fursenko and Timothy Naftali that is based on those documents. They called it One Hell of a Gamble: The Secret History of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

What Ever Happened To Our fear Of Armageddon?

Perhaps the fates (or the laws of probability) are having a bit of fun at our expense, or maybe this is their way of providing yet another warning, but the possibility of nuclear war is once again in the air, as it was 60 years ago this month during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Trying to understand today’s problems through the lens of history and historical example is always fraught. Circumstances change with the times; today is not yesterday. Still, human beings are more or less the same. The biases, impulses, and hubris that influenced decision-making in 1962 are alive and well despite the species’ best efforts. So what can the Cuban Missile Crisis tell us about today’s nuclear dangers? First, it reveals lessons that were obvious then and that have stood the passage of time. But it can also tell us something today that could not have been understood in the moment or even years later.

Cuba: 60 Years Of The Missile Crisis

This October, Cuba remembers the installation of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba, a decision that triggered one of the worst crises of the so-called Cold War. For several days, the world was on the brink of a war with incalculable consequences, which showed the will of the Cuban people to defend their sovereignty at any cost. Sixty years after the crisis, Resumen Latinoamericano takes a look back at the days of terror in which the world was on the brink of World War III in an unprecedented nuclear conflict. It isn’t possible to understand the crisis without an in-depth analysis of the events in the US policy towards Cuba, which led to the presence of the missiles in Cuba. The story goes back to 1959, when the Cuban Revolution led by Fidel Castro overthrew the US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista and emerged as a new social justice paradigm, something Washington was unwilling to tolerate.

¡Patria O Muerte! Che Guevara’s 1964 United Nations Speech

Cuba comes here to state its position on the most important points of controversy and will do so with the full sense of responsibility that the use of this rostrum implies, while at the same time fulfilling the unavoidable duty of speaking clearly and frankly. We would like to see this Assembly shake itself out of complacency and move forward. We would like to see the committees begin their work and not stop at the first confrontation. Imperialism wants to turn this meeting into a pointless oratorical tournament, instead of solving the serious problems of the world. We must prevent it from doing so. This session of the Assembly should not be remembered in the future solely by the number 19 that identifies it. Our efforts are directed to that end.

Let Cuba Rebuild!

The US sanctions and embargo are preventing Cuba from rebuilding after Hurricane Ian. The Biden Administration needs to act right now to help the Cuban people. Hurricane Ian caused great devastation. The power grid was damaged, and the electrical system collapsed. Over four thousand homes have been completely destroyed or badly damaged. Cuba must be allowed, even if just for the next six months, to purchase the necessary construction materials to rebuild. Cubans are facing a  major setback because of Hurricane Ian. Despite Cuba’s well-known preparedness for natural disasters, the damage from this hurricane has been immense. In the western province of Pinar del Rio, famous for Its tobacco production, over 5,000 farms were destroyed. In small towns like San Luis, 80% of all homes were left damaged.

Cuba Says Yes To The Code Of Families!

Cuba dawned today with great expectation for the long-awaited news: The Family Code will be law, after the majority of Cubans supported the document during the popular Referendum held on Sunday. Early this morning, the president of the National Electoral Council (CEN), Alina Balseiro Gutiérrez, announced in a live broadcast that the preliminary results of the vote count has affirmed that the Code will be law. The count at this point has determined that 3,936,790 of the 6,251,786 Cubans who went to the polls voted Yes for the document (66.87 percent). With most of the ballots counted, the electoral authority assured that 1,950,090 people voted NO, (33.13 percent).

Punishing Cuba: The Self-Serving ‘State Sponsors Of Terror’ List

Today car and bike caravans in many U.S. cities are rightly demanding that Cuba be taken off the U.S. State Department’s “State Sponsors of Terrorism” list. Did you know there was such a thing? Every presidential administration appoints a secretary of state. Now it is Antony Blinken; before him was Mike Pompeo, and under Obama it was John Kerry and Hillary Clinton. And the president, through the secretary of state, can put countries on this list or take them off. It is that arbitrary. As a parting slam against Cuba, on Jan. 12, 2021, just eight days before Joe Biden assumed the presidency, the Trump administration condemned Cuba once again. And Biden has let it stand, although he can waive provisions or decide to remove Cuba from the list altogether.

Sanctions Won’t Stop Latin American Leaders From Talking With US Workers

On September 24, leaders from Cuba and Venezuela will speak at an event titled “The People’s Summit: Democracy Beyond the US Empire”. The event is convened by the International Peoples’ Assembly, an international network of people’s movements and organizations. The event will be held in the historic Riverside Church in Morningside Heights, as the UN General Assembly convenes further downtown in Manhattan. Speakers include Bruno Rodriguez, the Foreign Minister of Cuba, Carlos Faria, the Foreign Minister of Venezuela, Kristin Richardson Jordan, District 9 Council Member for New York City, Vijay Prashad, Director of the Tricontinental Institute of Social Research, and Claudia De La Cruz, Co-Executive Director of The People’s Forum.

Life Expectancy: The US And Cuba In The Time Of Covid

Recent data shows that between 2019 and 2021, life expectancy (LE) in the US plunged almost three years while for Cuba it edged up 0.2 years. Yet, in 1960, the year after its revolution, Cuba had a LE of 64.2 years, lower by 5.6 years than that in the US (69.8 years). As I document in Cuban Health Care, the island quickly caught up to the US and, from 1970 through 2016, the two countries were nip and tuck, with some years Cuba and other years the US, having a longer LE. But neither country was ever as much as one year of LE ahead of the other. This continued through the beginning of Covid, which sharply changed the pattern. LE in the US suddenly dropped behind that in Cuba. Bernd Debusmann Jr.of BBC News wrote, "LE in the US fell “to the lowest level seen since 1996. Government data showed LE at birth now stands at 76.1 compared to 79 in 2019. That is the steepest two-year decline in a century.”

The US Keeps Betting On Cuba Surrendering Out Of Desperation

Last week, US President Joe Biden extended for one more year the sanctions on Cuba, arguing the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917. This mechanism has been used for the last 60 years to back the countless sanctions that make up the US blockade against Cuba. This time, Biden only limited himself to saying that it was a “matter of interest to the United States.” By a stroke of the pen, he condemned the Cuban people to continue to suffer all the economic shortages caused by the blockade. Sanctioning and playing with the welfare of millions of people, with their very lives, seems to be a reflex action of US political class.

Milwaukee Cuba Caravan Highlights The Damage Caused By The US Blockade

Thirty Cuba solidarity activists heard updates, Sunday, August 28, on how the people of the island are adapting to the ongoing impacts of the US economic blockade and the recent fire at an oil depot in Matanzas, fifty miles from Havana.  Three members of the Party for Socialism and Liberation gave report backs from a recent visit to the island, which included the delivery of humanitarian assistance, part of the Hatuey Project.  The updates preceded a car caravan, one of many around the country, demanding an end to the US blockade of Cuba. Sam Doucas, Erica Steib, and Alexa 'Lex' Nutile spoke about Cuba’s justified reputation for providing health care for all of its citizens. They pointed out that Cuba’s infant mortality rate is less than that of the more developed United States. However, because of the 62-year US economic blockade, the Cuban health care system is short of vital medicines and diagnostics and surgical equipment to facilitate health on the island. To help support Cubans’ health, the three PSL members joined with others in the Hatuey Project to bring medical supplies to support maternal care on the island.

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Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

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