U.S. hands off Cuba!
U.S. imperialism is carrying out a siege of Cuba, applying collective punishment to its people by starving them and threatening a military assault. The Cuban government and Communist Party refuse to submit and have mobilized the population to resist.
Through 67 years of active solidarity with the working class of the world, the Cuban Revolution has earned a return of solidarity. The first step is to clarify the root of the problem.
U.S. imperialism’s hostility and its over 60-year blockade of Cuba — which have cost Cuba $170 billion — have caused all the major problems the Cuban population now faces.
The Cuban government and Communist Party’s decision to orient toward building socialism, far from being the cause of the problem, has created wonders in healthcare, education and organization to confront natural and imperialist-imposed disasters. And Cuba has shared this progress internationally.
It is to the credit of the Cuban government and Communist Party that they have been able to protect Cuba’s socialist orientation and sovereignty while located only 90 miles away from the main enemy of humanity. And they have done this for 35 years after the loss of Cuba’s main ally, the Soviet Union.
The current MAGA regime in Washington is now imposing an extreme siege on the Cuban island and its people reminiscent of medieval sieges of cities by attacking armies. It amounts to a war of aggression, collective punishment of all Cuban workers and farmers. It is a war crime and a crime against humanity.
Regarding this war crime, anyone in U.S. government organizations or the U.S. military who enforces this siege, anyone who takes part in a military assault on Cuba, will be guilty of war crimes. As six Democratic members of Congress made clear last December — troops and government agents have the right and the duty to refuse orders to carry out these crimes.
Great strides despite blockade
Despite this blockade’s costs, Cuba has made enormous contributions to the people of the world.
The magnificent health organization that the Revolution developed has educated doctors from around the world, has sent teams of doctors and other health workers to aid the poorest sectors of many countries, has sent emergency teams to mitigate the impact of floods and earthquakes and pandemics. Think of Haiti, Pakistan, even Italy during the COVID-19 emergency.
U.S. imperialism added to its crimes by coercing the governments of some countries to break their arrangements with Cuban doctors, depriving millions of people of healthcare. Cuban health organizations discovered that the blockade prevented life-saving medicine from being provided to people in the U.S.
The Cuban political leaders, backed by a pledge of the population, have vowed to fight rather than submit to the rule of U.S. imperialism and the Miami criminals who have plotted against the Cuban population since the 1959 Revolution.
The solidarity that Cuba’s government and people have shown to people all over the world has already inspired flotillas bringing humanitarian aid from solidarity organizations from many lands. In addition, deliveries of substantial aid have come from Mexico, Russia, Iran and People’s China, which brought equipment to produce electricity from solar power.
Cuba has aided the workers and poor of the world, including the United States. Providing political asylum to U.S. government-targeted Black revolutionaries such as the late Assata Shakur is one heroic example of Cuba’s anti-racist solidarity.
Workers World newspaper calls on all progressive forces in the United States to continue to mobilize against the U.S. blockade of Cuba and to keep increasing the popular disgust with the present regime in Washington to end the siege.
Defend the Cuban Revolution!
