The Cuban Embargo

Kent Griffith

Blog Post #1

April 20, 2016

            During the Cold War, the tensions between the United States and Cuba relations became very strained. In the late 1950’s Fidel Castro and a group of Cuban revolutionaries seized power in the capital city of Havana. Since the 1960’s the United States administration have initiated a number of economic sanctions on Cuba. During the United States tried to overthrow the Castro regime with the invasion of the Bay of Pigs. Also at this time the United States found out that the Cuban and Soviet Union governments were planning on attacking the United States with missiles of mass destruction Diplomatic and economic relations between the United States and Cuba became strained. When the Cuban government increased trade with the Soviet Union, nationalized U.S properties and hiked imports coming from America the U.S reacted with retribution. The United States instituted a ban on nearly all exports to Cuba. The was expanded more during John F. Kennedy’s Administration to a full economic embargo with travel restrictions.

            Cuba since has come into the news as diplomatic relations have change with the United States. President Obama came into presidency wanting to strengthen engagement with Cuba. In February, new rules were issued by the United States which chipped away at the ongoing economic sanctions. Some of these rules include insurance companies to cover health, life, and travel insurances for individuals visiting in Cuba, U.S companies can now invest in small buildings and shipment of building materials to private Cuban companies is now allowed. These new rules give hope for the future that the Cuban Embargo will be lifted.

            A trade embargo can be detrimental to a country’s economy. A trade embargo is the partial or complete prohibition of trade between a country or a group of countries. It is said that the Cuban Embargo cost Cuba approximately 1.24 trillion dollars. During a trade embargo trade between two countries does not exists. This means that both countries can not import and export goods to each other. This would seriously decrease your net exports if you export a lot of goods to that country. An embargo would also decrease the outflows of cash for the countries since the countries can not trade with each other. Also an embargo would have a negative effect on economic growth since a country would have to use another country that might have higher trade rates.



http://www.cfr.org/cuba/us-cuba-relations/p11113