Cuba's socialist collapse can only be reversed through costly Western private-capital intervention, since the alternatives are a Chinese colony or a narco-state
Source: https://www.facebook.com/americanspectator/. "What Socialism Has Wrought in Cuba Will Be a Nightmare to Unwind | The American Spectator | USA News and Politics." October 13, 2026. spectator.org
The Gist
The author says Cuba is falling apart under communism, but fixing it will be enormously expensive and complicated because the military owns much of the economy and old property-seizure debts must be settled. He argues the best realistic hope is for private Western money to step in, since otherwise Cuba will likely become either a Chinese colony or a drug-trafficking state.
Conclusion
Cuba's communist regime is in terminal decline, and because unwinding the damage socialism has done is so costly and complicated, the most plausible path to a free Cuba is a private-sector, Western-capital rescue, which is preferable to the likely alternatives of a Chinese colony or a narco-state.
Premises
- Cuba's current condition is unsustainable: electricity is available only a few hours a day, the average worker earns about $16 per month, sewerage and trash services have collapsed, airports are shutting down for lack of jet fuel, and the population has fallen from 11 million to under 9.5 million in five years.
- The regime has survived this long because the U.S. missed opportunities to push a transition after the Cold War (Clinton, Bush and Obama), and because Cuba sustained itself by draining Venezuela, a resource that is now gone.
- The Cuban military conglomerate GAESA controls about 40 percent of the economy, including the ports, hotels and gas stations, and the regime's debts likely exceed the size of the economy, so a transition faces entrenched armed interests who will demand their share.
- U.S. law bars full lifting of the embargo until roughly $9 billion or more in certified expropriation claims are settled, a sum the current regime cannot pay and a successor could pay only by liquidating state enterprises like GAESA.
- Standing Cuba back up as a functional country is estimated to cost about $90 billion, and the economy has little to build on because tourism, coffee, rum and cigars have collapsed.
- If Western capital does not take over, the likeliest alternatives are Cuba becoming a Chinese colony (increasingly unlikely as Chinese influence and capital wane) or a narco-state (the dangerous one, which could require U.S. military involvement).
Assumptions
- Socialism and communist rule are the primary cause of Cuba's economic collapse, rather than the U.S. embargo or other external factors.
- A transition away from the current regime is desirable and will eventually happen.
- Private-sector or Western capital is both able and willing to fund a $90 billion rebuild and to settle the expropriation debt.
- The three alternatives (Western capital takeover, Chinese colony, narco-state) are the only realistic outcomes.
- Local, pilot-project-style capitalist enclaves can scale into a national transition.
- Investors can be protected from the predations of the current regime or its successors.
- Past U.S. inaction, rather than the regime's own resilience or popular support, explains its survival.