Cuba is Demanding Reparations from the U.S.

Recent details from negotiations with Cuba indicate the path to friendship with the ostracized counrty is a rocky one. Among demands they are asking for the return of Gitmo, and that reparations be made to their citizens for financial damages sustained during the embargo.

A refresher on why and how the embargo came to be:

The United States embargo against Cuba (in Cuba called el bloqueo, "the blockade") is a commercial, economic, and financial embargo imposed by the United States on Cuba. An embargo was first imposed by the United States on Cuba on 19 October 1960 (almost two years after the Batista regime was deposed by the Cuban Revolution) when the US placed an embargo on exports to Cuba except for food and medicine after Cuba nationalized American-owned Cuban oil refineries without compensation. On 7 February 1962 the embargo was extended to include almost all imports. Currently, the Cuban embargo is enforced mainly through six statutes: the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917, the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, the Cuban Assets Control Regulations of 1963, the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992, the Helms–Burton Act of 1996, and the Trade Sanctions Reform and Export Enhancement Act of 2000.

The stated purpose of the Cuban Democracy Act of 1992 is to maintain sanctions on Cuba so long as the Cuban government refuses to move toward "democratization and greater respect for human rights". The Helms–Burton Act further restricted United States citizens from doing business in or with Cuba, and mandated restrictions on giving public or private assistance to any successor government in Havana unless and until certain claims against the Cuban government were met. In 1999, President Bill Clinton expanded the trade embargo by also disallowing foreign subsidiaries of U.S. companies to trade with Cuba. In 2000, Clinton authorized the sale of "humanitarian" U.S. products to Cuba.

Wiki

Of course the country has not been ostracized from the entire world and still maintains trade relationships with multiple countries.

Despite the Spanish term bloqueo (blockade), there has been no physical, naval blockade of the country by the United States after the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. The United States does not block Cuba's trade with third parties: other countries are not under the jurisdiction of U.S. domestic laws, such as the Cuban Democracy Act (although, in theory, foreign countries that trade with Cuba could be penalised by the U.S., which has been condemned as an "extraterritorial" measure that contravenes "the sovereign equality of States, non-intervention in their internal affairs and freedom of trade and navigation as paramount to the conduct of international affairs."). Cuba can, and does, conduct international trade with many third-party countries;[ Cuba has been a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) since 1995.

source: again wiki

Castro has laid out a list of demands including:

"The re-establishment of diplomatic relations is the start of a process of normalizing bilateral relations, but this will not be possible while the blockade still exists, while they don't give back the territory illegally occupied by the Guantanamo naval base," Castro told delegates.

He also demanded the U.S. end the transmission of anti-Castro radio and television broadcasts and deliver "just compensation to our people for the human and economic damage that they're suffered."

Source: www.nbcnews.com...

John Kerry has indicated our leasing Guantanamo Bay from Cuba will likely continue until the prisoners there are relocated. He has not commented on whether reparations should be paid for damages caused by the embargo.
I'm wondering if paying them might start a precedence with all countries who have been sanctioned. Iran, Russia, and North Korea could also start demanding money for damages and looking to the U.S. to pay them. I'm wondering if this is a precedent we should be reluctant to establish.

Well, that didn't take long.
I'm sure the Castros and Obama are of like minds on reparations and how evil the U.S. is...so their check is probably already in the mail.

a reply to: ladyinwaiting

(almost two years after the Batista regime was deposed by the Cuban Revolution)

Yah, we spent two years trying to foment insurrection (Bay of Pigs fiasco) and assassinate Castro before giving up and cutting the island off from the world in general.

It was precisely that the Cubans took back their land from the US puppet regime in the first place that is the reason that the US has imposed sanctions ever since.

You're right, the people want Guantanmao back, too. And self determination…

All the US wants is for Cuba to open millions of hungry mouths to Mc Donalds and Walmart.

Otherwise, Master Blaster runs Barter Town.

Reuters article

a reply to: ladyinwaiting

Out of interest, is there any country except North America that has had a trade embargo with Cuba? I fairly much thought it was America only, or at least if any other country does have sanctions in place that I'm unaware of, I don't think they would have any connection to the American embargo.

Cuba shouldn't worry. They'll get reparations when US tourists start traveling en masse to Cuba and spend millions in a new found US tourism industry.

Can we give them Obama for reparations?

They sided with the Soviets during the Cold War and since it ended, they have not received the aid that was being pumped in to their economy, so Russia could have an ally right next door. Massive import tax keeps them driving cars from the 50s, along with having to get government permission to import anything.
So, it's our fault.

Maybe Cuba can pay back the US companies that they stole from all those years ago:

Relations between the United States and Cuba deteriorated rapidly as the Cuban government, in reaction to the refusal of Royal Dutch Shell, Standard Oil and Texaco to refine petroleum from the Soviet Union in Cuban refineries under their control, took control of those refineries in July 1960.
The Eisenhower administration promoted a boycott of Cuba by oil companies, to which Cuba responded by nationalizing the refineries in August 1960. Both sides continued to escalate the dispute.
Cuba expropriated more US-owned properties, notably those belonging to the International Telephone and Telegraph Company (ITT) and the United Fruit Company. In the Castro government's first agrarian reform law, on 17 May 1959, the state sought to limit the size of land holdings, and to distribute that land to small farmers in "Vital Minimum" tracts. This law was used as the pretext for seizing lands held by foreigners and redistributing them to Cuban citizens.

Wikipedia: History of Cuba

Maybe they could tack on about 56 years of interest when they pay those reparations!

Its just diplomatic grand standing.

Both sides will BS each other until a insignificant deal is made thats nothing to do with the above demands.

a reply to: butcherguy

Or maybe the US government should reimburse those companies for trying to destabilise the country they were doing business with....cause and effect and all that

The U.S. established the Guantanamo base in 1903, and the current Cuban government has been demanding the land's return since the 1959 revolution that brought it to power.

The Obama administration has pledged to close the high-security prison at the facility, and has been transferring terror detainees to their own countries.

Source: NBC article

The issue of the Guantanamo Base is not huge for me. I actually posted this thread because it might be early to form an opinion about monetary reparations, and am trying to decide if they have a good case in favor of this, or if these demands should be taken off the table. I know what my thoughts are early on, but wanted some opinions from other posters. You guys are making me read between the lines!

a reply to: ladyinwaiting

I have to laugh at the attempt, because actually US has been funding Cuba for decades.

See US paid Cuba $4,085 a month in rent for the controversial Guantanamo naval base,
But only once Cuba cashed one of the checks, soooo, that means $4,085 a month since 1959, is more than a enough to fix the problem

Right?

www.reuters.com...

I am trying to find how much they are asking for.

Castro said United States payment of hundreds of millions of dollars in economic reparations for damages caused by the five-decade-old embargo, and indeed a lifting of the embargo Cuba considers a “blockade,” would also have to take place before the two adversaries can renew relations that were severed soon after the Cuban revolution of 1959.

I'm not completely clear on what this means:

But Castro’s reparation demands also carry a risk. That’s because they virtually guarantee reawakening the sensitive issue of the estimated billions of dollars in reparations that US citizens, American businesses, and Cuban-Americans claim are owed for properties and businesses seized from them in the revolution.

www.csmonitor.com...

originally posted by: marg6043
a reply to: ladyinwaiting

I have to laugh at the attempt, because actually US has been funding Cuba for decades.

See US paid Cuba $4,085 a month in rent for the controversial Guantanamo naval base,
But only once Cuba cashed one of the checks, soooo, that means $4,085 a month since 1959, is more than a enough to fix the problem

Right?

www.reuters.com...

They haven't cashed the checks! I have not heard that! Definitely bazaar and no doubt a form of manipulation we will soon enough realize.

a reply to: ladyinwaiting

I know, I mean over 4 thousand a month since 1959!!!!! that is a lot of money, right?

Automatically makes me think of this......

a reply to: marg6043

Good Lord Marg, it's actually since 1903!

1903 - The new Republic of Cuba leases 45 square miles of land in Guantánamo Bay to the U.S. for construction of a naval station. Building on the naval station begins that same year. 1934 - Cuba and the U.S. sign a perpetual lease that rents the 45 square miles of Cuba to the U.S. for $4,085.00 a year.Sep 9, 2013




Guantanamo Bay Naval Station Fast Facts - CNN.com



www.cnn.com/2013/09/09/.../guantanamo-bay-naval-station-fast-facts/

But I didn't see anything about the year they stopped cashing the checks.

a reply to: ladyinwaiting

Those are millions right? My math is not that good and my calculator in the computer is no very friendly user at least for me.

1913, that is over a century.

originally posted by: ken10
a reply to: butcherguy

Or maybe the US government should reimburse those companies for trying to destabilise the country they were doing business with....cause and effect and all that

Or maybe Merry Olde England could pay it for us, more cause and effect.

a reply to: ladyinwaiting

Russia and the US needs to split the bill.