Cuba's Unique Challenges to U.S. Regime Change Efforts

The U.S. is increasing pressure on Cuba, but unlike Venezuela, the island nation lacks a clear opposition leader or succession plan. Cuba's cohesive and ideologically entrenched government, coupled with U.S. legal constraints and its state-run economy, present significant challenges to regime change efforts.

U.S. President Donald Trump's administration has been stepping up pressure on Communist-controlled Cuba, after using the military in January to remove Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

Here is why Cuba may not be Venezuela 2.0, even though Caracas had been a key supporter of the island's government.

Also read: Rare public appearances, low profile mark Raul Castro's life since stepping down as Cuba's president

WHO WOULD TAKE OVER?

In Venezuela, then-Vice President Delcy Rodriguez took over as U.S. forces seized Maduro in a lightning raid on Jan. 3 and has served as acting president since.

Rodriguez was Maduro's deputy, but there is no similar deputy to Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel, or former President Raul Castro, the 94-year-old former president the U.S. indicted this week in a bid to increase pressure on Havana.

"The security apparatus ‌in Cuba has dismantled, systematically dismantled, ⁠every alternative ⁠or potentially alternative power source," said Orlando Perez, an expert on U.S.-Latin America relations at the University of North Texas in Dallas.

Venezuela also has a popular opposition leader, Nobel laureate Maria Corina Machado, who won elections in 2024 but was not allowed to take power and hopes to return to her home country this year for free elections. Cuba has no similar figure. Raul Rodriguez Castro, grandson of the former president, met this month with CIA Director John Ratcliffe during a rare visit by a U.S. spy chief to Havana, fueling talk he might agree to work with Washington. But the younger Castro has no formal position in the Cuban government and is not expected to betray his family. He attended a rally in Havana on Friday to protest his grandfather's indictment.

WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS AND RISKS?

Cuba has been a U.S. antagonist for decades, since Fidel Castro's 1959 revolution. Trump is strongly supported by hardline Cuban-Americans in Florida, who have pushed for U.S.-instigated regime change for decades. The Republican ⁠U.S. president has ‌made clear he wants to see change in their homeland.

In the past, Cuba was seen as a threatening Soviet satellite, an uncomfortably close 90 miles from Florida, and more recently as a potential site for Chinese influence in the Western Hemisphere. But Russia's attentions have shifted elsewhere since the fall of the Soviet bloc, and Cuba's economic problems ⁠have diminished its ability to confront the U.S.

Experts say instability in Cuba also threatens a migration crisis. Its people have been living largely without power due to the U.S. blockade and could opt to flee the island in case of war or chaos.

Cuba's military is more ideologically entrenched and cohesive than Venezuela's and more likely to put up a fight. Dozens of Cuban agents were killed in Venezuela in January when they were providing security for Maduro, but survivors would have learned from that raid how U.S. forces operate.

Cuba is also seen as more advanced in surveillance and intelligence, especially after years of cooperation with Russia and China.

Also read: US weighs drone threat from Cuba: Report

WHAT WOULD CUBA BRING TO THE U.S.?

Venezuela has natural resources, and U.S. companies have been lining up to produce oil in the South American country, which has seen exports jump.

Cuba does not have any similar resource. Its state-run tourism industry was behind other Caribbean destinations in price and quality even before this year's steep downturn, which has been exacerbated by shortages tied to Trump's "maximum pressure" campaign, a ‌U.S. blockade and threats of tariffs for countries that provide it with fuel.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, an outspoken Cuba hawk who is also national security adviser, is seen as the force behind the Trump administration's Cuban policy.

Rubio, a Florida native and the son of Cuban immigrants, has run for president before and is expected to seek the office again. A major change in Cuba could ⁠burnish his political ambitions, but a failure poses major risks at a time when the U.S. faces huge budget deficits and is already waging a campaign in Iran that has been estimated to cost billions of dollars per day.

WHAT ARE THE LEGAL ISSUES?

Washington's ability to change relations with Cuba is limited by the 1996 Helms-Burton Act, which ties the lifting of a decades-long U.S. embargo to specific political change such as the creation of a democratically elected government.

Trump changed U.S. business relations with Venezuela by removing Maduro, leaving its government in place without even announcing plans for free elections.

In Cuba, he could not legally do so without a dramatic shift by Cuban officials, who have refused so far to cooperate. Cuba's situation is more complicated because the country's economy lacks a private sector. It is dominated by Gaesa, a military conglomerate subject to U.S. sanctions that controls most of the island's top hotels, largest port, top commercial bank and a vast array of supermarkets, gas stations and remittance businesses.

Washington also justified the Venezuela raid by saying Maduro's government was involved in "narcoterrorism." Cuban officials have not faced such charges, and in fact its government says it has been cooperating with the U.S. against drug trafficking.