I’m Isaac Saul, and this is Tangle: an independent, nonpartisan, subscriber-supported politics newsletter that summarizes the best arguments from across the political spectrum on the news of the day — then “my take.”

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Today’s read: 15 minutes.

Stranded in the Middle East.

When the United States and Israel launched strikes against Iran at the end of February, airspaces shut down and commercial flights were cancelled across the region. For Americans in the Middle East, the following days were marked by chaotic attempts to evacuate and inconsistent communication from U.S. embassies. Associate Producer Aidan Gorman has experienced embassy evacuations firsthand, and in our latest YouTube video he breaks down what happened, what should have happened, and the stark realities of evacuation policies. Check it out here:

Quick hits.

1. The Israeli military said it killed Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, and Gholamreza Soleimani, commander of the Basij paramilitary group, in airstrikes. (The strikes) Separately, on Wednesday morning, Israel said it killed Iranian Intelligence Minister ​Esmail Khatib in an overnight strike. (The latest)
2. National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent resigned from his position, citing his opposition to the war in Iran. Kent also claimed the U.S. became involved in the conflict due to pressure from Israel. (The resignation)
3. The Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs Committee is holding a confirmation hearing for Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK), President Trump’s nominee for Department of Homeland Security secretary. (The hearing)
4. Illinois Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton defeated Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi in the Democratic Senate primary to replace retiring Sen. Dick Durbin. Former state GOP Chair Don Tracy won the Republican nomination for the seat. (The results)
5. Afghanistan said over 400 people were killed in a Pakistani strike on a drug rehabilitation hospital in the capital city of Kabul. Pakistan denied it was responsible for the strike. (The incident)

Today’s topic.

Cuba’s energy crisis. On Monday, Cuba’s electrical grid failed, causing a blackout that affected the island’s nearly 11 million inhabitants. Cuba’s Ministry of Energy and Mines confirmed that it was investigating a complete disconnect of the island’s grid, which sparked both violent and non-violent protests. After 29 hours, power was restored to most of the island, although much of the country remains without service as of Wednesday morning. Cuba has been experiencing worsened power disruptions since the United States increased its economic pressure on the island. On January 11, President Donald Trump announced he would prevent Venezuelan oil from reaching Cuba, then announced heightened tariffs on any country selling oil to Cuba on January 29.  

Back up: Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean governed as a single-party socialist state under the Communist Party, with a centrally planned economy and limited political freedoms. Since the nation’s communist revolution in 1959, the United States and Cuba have maintained a complicated diplomatic relationship; the Obama administration began moving towards normalizing relations in 2015, but those moves have been mostly reversed under subsequent Trump administrations. Cuba’s electrical grid is outdated and relies mostly on power plants fueled by imported oil, and the disruption caused by the U.S. blockade has sparked rolling failures.

Cuba has received only two shipments of oil this year, one regular shipment from Mexico in January and a discharge for liquefied petroleum gas — or cooking gas — from Jamaica in February. Cuba has not received a shipment of oil from Venezuela, which had been its main supplier, this year. China has been increasing its energy investment in Cuba over recent years, and as much as 10% of the island’s electricity may now be produced by Chinese solar parks.

The power outages have prompted rare violent protests at the Communist Party’s headquarters in Morón, where videos posted online appear to show protesters setting fires and ransacking the office. At least five people have been arrested in connection to the protests, according to Cuba’s Interior Ministry.

With Cuba in a compromised position, President Donald Trump has publicly considered taking over the communist nation. “I do believe I’ll [have] the honor of taking Cuba,” Trump said on Monday. “Taking Cuba in some form … whether I free it, take it, I think I can do anything I want with it if you want to know the truth. They’re a very weakened nation right now.”

Cuba and the United States have engaged in talks to resolve the current situation. “Agendas are built, negotiations and conversations take place, and agreements are reached — things we are still far from because we are in the initial phases of this process,’’ Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said of the talks. 

We’ll get into what the right and left are saying about the situation in Cuba below, followed by Executive Editor Isaac Saul’s take.

What the right is saying.

• Many on the right support U.S. action to oust the Cuban regime, though not necessarily through force. 
• Some note that efforts to overpower Cuba have failed before.
• Others say deposing Maduro also incapacitated the Cuban regime. 

In The New York Post, Daniel McCarthy said “Trump is making Cuba an offer it can’t refuse.”

“Cuba is overdue for a profound change, and Trump is determined to bring it about. It’s been a lifelong goal of the Cuban-American who now serves as secretary of state, too,” McCarthy wrote. “What Trump and Marco Rubio have planned won’t look exactly like the operation that captured Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro, or like the obliteration of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and most of his senior staff in the war now being waged against Iran. But Cuban officials have seen just how far the Trump administration is willing to go.”

“Do they work out a deal with America, or do they take their chances with an administration that’s become very comfortable with the use of force? For now, Trump is using economic leverage to bring Havana around,” McCarthy said. “The president isn’t expecting Thomas Jefferson to replace Raul Castro or Miguel Diaz-Canel — the transition to democracy can take time, and the old regime can exit with a parachute, if it makes a deal… Cuba has a bright future, but those in charge in Havana today will have no future at all if they rebuff the friendly takeover Trump offers.”

In MS NOW, Daniel R. DePetris wrote “Trump’s Cuba strategy is straightforward. The outcome will be anything but.”

“The strategy is straightforward: place so much financial pressure on the Cuban government that it has no option but to meet Trump’s demands, like opening up the country to a multi-party democracy,” DePetris said. “Trump seems confident he can do to Cuba what he did to Venezuela more than two months ago — decapitate the senior leadership, work with more pragmatic underlings and bring a former U.S. adversary into Washington’s orbit… But if the White House is looking to emulate its success in Venezuela, it’s likely kicking on a locked door.”

“This is hardly the first time in U.S. history that an American president has tried to squeeze the island into submission… None of those efforts worked to change the Cuban regime from within, let alone topple it,” DePetris wrote. “The only people who have been negatively impacted by U.S. policy over the last six decades are the Cuban people themselves, whose lives are a constant struggle for basic necessities and who are effectively penalized for their own rulers’ incompetence. Is more of the same really going to bring different results?”

In The American Spectator, Scott McKay suggested “Castro’s crumbling regime nears its end.”

“The Castroite regime is almost gone. It certainly can’t survive its inability to supply power to its people. And it can’t blame Trump or his ‘oil blockade.’… The executive order the president issued in January didn’t blockade Cuba. It threatened tariffs against countries giving Cuba free oil or selling oil to Cuba,” McKay said. “What Trump really did was to interdict Venezuela’s providing free oil to Cuba, and he did that not so much out of a blockade of Cuba but out of an enforcement of U.S. sanctions against Venezuelan oil exports. And then a raid on Caracas took down Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, occasioning a Venezuelan government much more pliable to American interests, and that was the end of free Venezuelan oil for Cuba.”

“It’s dark every night all over Cuba now, save for the light from the fire at Communist Party headquarters. But that darkness won’t last,” McKay wrote. “That regime is cooked. We’re down to days, not weeks, before it all comes down. This much is obvious. You can’t run a country so far into the ground that even those with influence can’t keep the lights on or the ceiling fan moving. And nobody believes Cuba’s dire straits are Trump’s fault. Especially not the Cubans, who are covering the crumbling walls of its buildings with pro-Trump graffiti.”

What the left is saying.

• The left is critical of Trump’s actions against Cuba, suggesting his strategy could create long-term consequences.
• Some call his energy blockade cruel and unnecessary.
• Others say Trump’s pressure campaign is criminal. 

In The New York Times, Christopher Sabatini and Katrin Hansing said “Trump isn’t ready for what he’s starting in Cuba.”

“Any resolution forged in the current standoff between Washington and Havana risks being a hollow victory, offering only a temporary reprieve for Cubans and a fleeting achievement for an administration that has yet to define what lasting success in Cuba looks like. A continued squeeze on the island aimed at the destruction of the state could bring chaos and perhaps even a new refugee crisis. A deal limited to managed economic liberalization could offer a brief diplomatic win, but it would most likely close off the chance of a real political opening,” Sabatini and Hansing wrote. “Still, catastrophe in Cuba is not a foregone conclusion. It also presents an opportunity — a chance for broader international engagement that could head off impending disaster.”

“Cuba’s decrepit state-led economic model has indeed failed. But an opening that injects market incentives without political change will not provide the security and predictability that an emerging private sector and foreign investors require,” Sabatini and Hansing said. “There is still an opportunity for a softer landing that could alleviate Cubans’ suffering and pave the way for a more stable and peaceful political and economic transition. But it requires Washington to coordinate with allies in the Western Hemisphere and in Europe.”

In The Guardian, Danny Valdes wrote “for the sake of both countries, Trump’s siege must end.”

“For Cuban Americans like me, the consequences of Trump’s declaration are not abstract. They are immediate, and devastating. Our families are running out of food. Our friends are unable to access medicine. While Marco Rubio, the secretary of state, speaks in the name of our ‘freedom’, he actively starves our communities of their most basic needs,” Valdes said. “In our community, this kind of doublespeak is nothing new. For decades, the United States has enforced a brutal embargo against the island, forcing its exclusion from the international systems of trade, finance, and tourism under the banner of ‘democracy promotion’.”

“The crisis that we are inflicting in Cuba should thus be a call to conscience for the entire United States — not just our small diasporic community. No country that claims to stand for human rights can allow policies that deepen hunger and desperation. No citizen who believes in basic dignity can accept this suffering as collateral damage,” Valdes wrote. “Cuba is our nextdoor neighbor: just 90 miles away from the Florida coast. Its people are our relatives, our friends, our coworkers and our fellow students. And right now, they need us to act with compassion.”

In Jacobin, Helen Yaffe called for “defend[ing] Cuba from US efforts to crush it.”

“For any of its flaws, Cuba has demonstrated that after centuries of colonialism and imperialist domination, a subjugated people can take control of their land and resources and chart their own path in development, international relations, and values,” Yaffe said. “The historic commitments to sovereignty and social justice by Cuban revolutionaries link the nineteenth-century wars of independence with the 1959 Revolution, the adoption of socialism, and the struggle against imperialism and underdevelopment. They also underpin Cuba’s symbolism for the Global South.”

“This Trump administration has shown utter contempt for international law. It has conducted extrajudicial killings in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean, hijacked oil tankers, kidnapping crews and seizing the oil. It has abducted Venezuela’s president and his wife and threatened invasion, even of its own NATO allies,” Yaffe wrote. “In this context, calls on Cuba to ‘make a deal’ with Trump amount to veiled threats against its sovereignty. Instead of dispensing advice to the besieged island, intellectuals and analysts should make demands of the US government, holding it accountable for its crimes.”

My take.

Reminder: “My take” is a section where we give ourselves space to share a personal opinion. If you have feedback, criticism or compliments, don’t unsubscribe. Write in by replying to this email, or leave a comment.

• Many commentators are mistakenly thinking of Cuba in the same terms as Iran, Venezuela, and Greenland.
• The cases for and against some form of U.S. intervention are compelling.
• I’m genuinely unsure of what we should do, even as I’m wary of more conflict. 

Executive Editor Isaac Saul: One of the most common errors in political analysis is creating patterns out of events that are actually distinct.

Amid the wide array of commentary about Cuba, a lot of otherwise smart and thoughtful political writers are making this mistake. It is, in some ways, irresistible: President Trump just launched prolonged military operations against Iran, a country with a repressive regime whose citizens seem fed up by the state of affairs in their country. On the surface, that sounds like Cuba. In Venezuela, Trump just ambushed the regime, removed President Nicolás Maduro from power, and brought him back to the United States on charges of drug trafficking. An economically devastated, Spanish-speaking country in the Global South with an association to drug trafficking? That sounds a lot like Cuba, too. The surface similarities invite us to see a pattern of action that may not exist.

So let me start with a moment of clarity: Cuba is not Venezuela. Cuba is not Iran. Cuba is not Greenland, Ukraine, Mexico, or any of the several countries Trump has had military, diplomatic, and economic standoffs with so far in his second term. And it should be written about distinctly. I think it is smart and healthy to look for patterns to anticipate potential outcomes. But I do not think it is wise to assume the outcomes will be the same, or create false equivalencies between Cuba and any other country. 

As readers of this newsletter know, I have been quite critical of some of Trump’s recent military, diplomatic, and economic interventions. I criticized his global tariffs and (eventually) suspected they’d be struck down as illegal. I recognized the geopolitical value of Greenland, but criticized the communicated approach of “acquiring” it by force or fortune. I loathed the Maduro regime but wondered about the motivations (oil) to upend it and the new standard the operation set in international law. And in Iran, I’ve been more explicitly critical, questioning the justification, the definition of a successful outcome, the legality, and the forward-looking plan. 

Yet with Cuba, I come into this potential intervention with much less certainty on whether the risks outweigh the upside. When I look at the specific geopolitical questions at play here, I genuinely don’t know how I feel, and I’m far less confident in my assessment of this issue than I was about the others. I feel torn.

To start with the upside, a few things here feel very distinct from the examples everyone is comparing Cuba to: First, Cuba is not only in our sphere of influence, but it’s close enough — just 90 miles south of the Florida Keys — to be a legitimate security concern. Russia and China have been making inroads on the island for decades, which further increases our national security interest there. Also, Cuban Americans who fled the Communist regime and live in the United States appear to be broadly supportive of (if not outright giddy about) the prospect of America forcing new leadership in Cuba. Their political interests, especially given how many have family or friends still trapped in Cuba, carry some weight here.

Second, Trump’s increased economic pressure seems to be advancing some diplomacy. The president’s pressure is not the core issue here. Cuba is in dire economic straits and has been long before Trump hit the political scene, because it is very reliant on imports, it doesn’t produce anything of value at scale (not even sugar), its dilapidated infrastructure has not been maintained, and its oppressive regime refuses to allow the proliferation of a free economy (for example: its “updated” laws include the state taking over 51% ownership of foreign joint ventures). 

Even in September of 2025, before our operation in Venezuela and before any oil embargo, reports of the dire situation in Cuba were everywhere. It is the peak of American-obsessive criticism, often proffered by non-interventionists and progressives, to look at Cuba and think we are responsible for all its struggles. As one Cuban economist put it in The New York Times, “What is happening in Cuba today is essentially the result of decades of structural economic failure under a rigid political system that has consistently resisted any reform.” Cuba’s communist leaders enjoy exorbitant wealth while their people have struggled to feed themselves for decades. If you’re upset about the economic conditions there, be upset about that. 

Now, with the regime in a moment of genuine weakness, Trump can offer incentives (like removing tariff threats on oil sales, opening access to Cuban markets, normalizing relations to encourage tourism, etc.) to drive Cuban leadership toward democratic practices and normalized relations with the United States. The talks seem geared toward avoiding military confrontation and instead exchanging economic relief for the first free and fair elections in Cuba in over 70 years. There is a single legal political party in Cuba; maybe they can have two? It shouldn’t be crazy to dream of something as basic as that. Unlike Iran, the Cuban government seems willing to engage in good faith in meaningful negotiations. Unlike Venezuela, where a military build-up coincided with diplomatic pressure, the potential for military conflict seems less likely. 

Third, and importantly, Cubans themselves seem very interested in buying whatever it is the Trump administration is selling. Protests against their current government are reaching a fever pitch, and the frustration is not about American policies but the decades of oppressive leadership and broken policies that have left nearly 11 million people to desperately imagine a post-Castro future.

To sum up the case for intervention here succinctly: The Trump administration has a compelling case to intervene in Cuba in a way that supports human rights and democratic change, protects U.S. national security and economic interests, and delivers a major political win to a distinct domestic constituency. All of that, to me, feels unique and valid.

But that doesn’t convince me U.S. intervention is a good thing, because even diplomatic intervention has plenty of risks too. The same Cuban people who stand to gain from intervention are also the ones most directly impacted by economic sanctions, not their exorbitantly wealthy communist rulers. Conditions on the ground in Cuba are already bleak — what if they get worse?

And if economic conditions worsen, street violence escalates, and the already chaotic and precarious moment in Cuba becomes disastrous, what happens then? Economic pressure alone rarely topples authoritarian regimes; that usually requires military force, and it is often a precursor for it. Given the history of our two countries, many Cubans are understandably wary of some “friendly U.S. takeover,” and it’s foolish to think U.S. soldiers could march through the streets of Havana to applause. A worsened economic situation could lead to a military confrontation of some kind, and one predictable outcome of that is thousands — if not hundreds of thousands — of Cubans fleeing the country. And, when they flee, we know where they’ll go: Florida.

This, obviously, would create just the kind of refugee crisis that the administration wants to avoid; it would also set up the horrifying, and likely, possibility that the administration turns away refugees it helped create. For me, this would be the worst-case scenario, and it feels only a few steps away.

So I just don’t know. On the one hand, our motivations for intervening in Cuba are more obvious, more grounded, more holistic, and more “just” than they have been in other countries in recent months. We have a Cuban-American secretary of State who has long sought this kind of change and seems well positioned to navigate it. Had this potential intervention begun last year, before fresh conflicts in Iran or military operations in Venezuela, I think the Trump administration could have much more easily sold me on this as a viable and worthwhile use of our resources, political capital, and economic might. 

On the other hand, this potential intervention is coming as a new war in Iran continues to expand and on the heels of an operation in Venezuela that does not seem to have satiated the administration’s thirst for regime change. Our president isn’t beating the drums of democracy; instead, he’s bragging about how easily he could simply “take” the country — “I could do anything I want with it,” he said — and as has become common, the quest seems more about his personal ambitions than the people he purports to be helping.

So I come to this possibility in a moment of wariness — both of war, and of the reshuffling of power. I want a better future for the Cuban people, yes, and I want our national interests off the coast of Florida to feel stable, definitely. But it’s hard to be pollyannish about the risks given the global instability in nearly every direction I look.

Take the survey: What do you think of the current situation in Cuba? Let us know.

Disagree? That’s okay. Our opinion is just one of many. Write in and let us know why, and we’ll consider publishing your feedback.

Your questions, answered.

Q: Any update on Maduro in prison? It’s been radio silence since his arrest.

— Austin from Oakland, CA

Tangle: As a reminder, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro was captured and brought to the United States on January 3. Along with his wife, Cilia Flores, Maduro has been indicted in the Southern District of New York. He is charged with “Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices, and Conspiracy to Possess Machineguns and Destructive Devices against the United States.” Maduro and Flores are being held at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) Brooklyn in New York, a waterfront facility currently housing 1,400 inmates.

Maduro and Flores appeared before U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein on January 5 and pleaded not guilty. The trial marks the first time the leader of another country has been tried in the United States since Manuel Noriega was convicted in 1992 on charges of drug trafficking, racketeering, and money laundering after the U.S. invasion of Panama in 1989.

Since Maduro was arrested as a sitting head of state, the trial is likely to be complicated. The discovery process alone is fraught, as potentially classified evidence will have to be handled carefully, and the case is not expected to even reach trial before the end of the year. Most recently, the U.S. blocked a request from Maduro’s legal team to use Venezuelan state funds to support the defense effort. Maduro and Flores are scheduled to next appear in court on March 26, where Judge Hellerstein is expected to hear arguments over the legal-fees dispute.

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Under the radar.

On Monday, a man charged with planting pipe bombs outside the Democratic and Republican Party headquarters the night before the January 6, 2021 Capitol riots asked a judge to dismiss the case, claiming clemency under President Trump’s pardon for January 6 rioters. The president’s clemency action applied to anyone convicted of or charged with crimes “related to events that occurred at or near the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021,” and the suspect’s lawyers argued that “unequivocally applies” to him. A White House official said the pardon does not cover this case, noting that the bombs were allegedly placed on January 5. Politico has the story. 

Numbers.

• 2. The approximate length, in years, of the normalization of Cuba–United States relations from July 2015 to June 2017. 
• 11.2 million. Cuba’s approximate population in 2017.
• 10.9 million. Cuba’s approximate population in 2026.
• 100,000. The number of barrels of oil a day used by Cuba’s power system to provide essential services. 
• 83.5%. Oil’s share of electricity generation in Cuba’s power grid.

The extras.

• One year ago today we covered the U.S. strikes against the Houthi rebels.
• The most clicked link in yesterday’s newsletter was the Tangle subreddit.
• Nothing to do with politics: What happens when you turn the worst Spider-Man movie into an episode of The Twilight Zone?
• Yesterday’s survey: 1,853 readers responded to our survey on tariff refunds with 44% predicting only a small number of importers will receive refunds. “I think everyone will see a refund. The real question is when,” one respondent said. “We’ve seen this is the administration of playing favorites; I have no reason to think they won’t play favorites with who gets refunds, too,” said another.

Have a nice day.

Three decades after the War of Independence ended, Croatia has officially declared itself free of landmines — a historic milestone for a country once devastated by conflict. At its peak, an estimated 13,000 square kilometers of land were contaminated with explosive remnants of war. Since signing the Ottawa Treaty in 1997, Croatia’s teams have found and destroyed around 107,000 landmines and 470,000 pieces of unexploded ordnance. “Croatia’s success provides a strong example of what can be achieved with sustained commitment,” said Jessica Hyland, Mines Advisory Group’s Regional Director for Eastern Europe. “Once hazardous landscapes can be safely returned to communities for homes, agriculture, and livelihoods.” Mines Advisory Group has the story.