Gambling in Havana?
By 
Oil reserves running low in Cuba:
After months of a debilitating energy crisis that has caused widespread power outages, Cuba’s oil reserves have run dry, the government said, which is likely to plunge the country into even more frequent, bigger and longer nationwide blackouts.
The government has been grappling with a severe energy crisis for more than two years because of crumbling infrastructure and a dwindling supply from its longtime benefactor Venezuela.
While Cuba produces some oil for domestic use, power plants are down and supplies have been exhausted, Vicente de la O Levy, Cuba’s minister of energy and mines, said on Wednesday night.
“We have absolutely no fuel oil, absolutely no diesel,” Mr. de la O Levy said. “In Havana, the blackouts today exceed 20 or 22 hours.”
US military presence in the Caribbean is increasing:
U.S. military and intelligence agencies have increased surveillance flights around and near Cuba in recent weeks, several U.S. officials said. The effort is part of a publicly visible campaign experts say is aimed at sending Cuban authorities a message: we’re watching you.
Navy and Air Force surveillance planes and drones have increased reconnaissance flights as part of what is expected to be a larger overall military buildup in the Caribbean in the coming weeks, two of the U.S. officials said. They and the other officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence or operational matters.
There’s a move afoot to indict Raul Castro, which may serve as a trigger for military action:
One of the officials says the criminal action is over two civilian planes on a volunteer mission that were downed by Cuba in 1996. Four Cuban Americans were killed.
The law enforcement effort against Castro, the brother of Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro, comes as President Donald Trump has grown increasingly frustrated with the Cuban government’s ability to maintain its grip on the island despite months of sustained U.S. pressure, NBC News has reported.
NBC News reached out to Cuba’s foreign ministry in Havana and the island’s embassy in Washington, D.C., for comment and did not immediately hear back.
And it seems as if the CIA is about in Havana.
I don’t know what to expect because I’m not sure what Trump wants… but I assume that it would involve something similar to Venezuela, in which a rump Cuban government remains in charge while opening markets etc. up to US investment. Poor old senile Raul may get to end his life in an American prison.
This is obviously barbaric, but it might work insofar as the objectives are limited. The complication as far as I can see it is the attitude of the Cuban community in Miami, which has never been dissuaded from its aspirations to reclaim property around the island. I doubt that Trump has thought very hard about how to manage expectations in that sector, although I suspect Rubio probably has. A quasi-invasion from Cuban-Americans could certainly disrupt the stability of any arrangement between Washington and Havana…
Photo Credit: By RenaatPeeters – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=95264999