🇲🇽 🇨🇺 🇺🇸 2 Mexican Navy ships laden with humanitarian aid dock in Cuba as US blockade sparks energy crisis

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Thursday that as soon as the ships return, “we will send more support of different kinds.” Her administration noted that it still plans to send 1,500 tons of beans and powdered milk.

Sheinbaum has previously said the humanitarian aid would be sent while diplomatic maneuvering to resume oil supplies is underway. She says Mexico has told the United States it seeks to promote peaceful dialogue and ensure Cuba “can receive oil and its derivatives for its daily operations.”

Cuba has also reduced bank hours and suspended cultural events, while fuel distribution companies have said that sales only will be made in dollars and limited to 20 liters (5.28 gallons) per user.

In addition to severe blackouts, Cuban officials say that U.S. sanctions, which increased under Trump’s second term, cost the country more than $7.5 billion between March 2024 and February 2025.

https://apnews.com/article/mexico-cuba-humanitarian-aid-havana-us-sanctions-52c44db94c9423511d67366662e78ac4

🛢 🇺🇸 🇨🇺 American officials are considering sending fuel to the island of Cuba to stave off a humanitarian crisis

Marco Rubio "could easily end up as the public face of an induced humanitarian crisis, along with another wave of Cuban 'boat people' crossing the 140km (90 miles) of water to the coast of Florida."

Mr. Rubio is one of the most powerful members of Mr Trump’s cabinet. He serves as both secretary of state and acting national security adviser. The only other person to hold both roles simultaneously was Henry Kissinger. While he appeared to be sidelined by some of the Trump administration’s special envoys on big foreign-policy projects in the Middle East and Ukraine, the Caracas raid has put him back in the spotlight. He is one of the architects of the president’s so-called Donroe doctrine, which prescribes dominance of the western hemisphere for the United States. “For Marco Rubio there is no better moment,” says Ricardo Herrero of the Cuba Study Group, which advocates for change in Cuba through dialogue and reconciliation.

Peaceful change would be far from simple to pull off. Unlike Mr Herrero, many of the 2.5m Cuban-Americans are hardliners. That includes south Florida’s three Cuban-American members of Congress. They want the Trump administration to impose even harsher measures on the regime, including a ban on family remittances to Cuba and a halt on all flights to the island by airlines based in the United States.

The White House doesn’t seem willing to go that far. It hopes instead that the fuel shortage will force the Cuban government to the table. Cuban officials have been pushing back, saying that discussions so far are preliminary, and that while they are open to dialogue, they will not change their one-party communist system.

The parallels between Venezuela and Cuba are limited. The Cuban regime is ideological and homogenous, where the Venezuelan one under Mr Maduro was split into factions and purely self-interested. Cuba’s security forces are also “more indoctrinated” than Venezuela’s, says Chris Sabatini of Chatham House, a think-tank based in London. Venezuela has abundant mineral wealth of the kind that allures Mr Trump. Cuba has little.

Given that, Mr Rubio is probably wise to string Cuba along. “Cuba is no longer self-sustaining,” says Mr Herrero. “Its only lifeline is the United States.” That may soon be more than a metaphor. Several sources tell The Economist that the United States is considering sending small quantities of fuel to the island: gas for cooking and diesel to keep water infrastructure running. Mr Rubio would gain even greater sway over his parents’ homeland.

https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2026/02/12/cubas-fate-may-be-in-marco-rubios-hands

📎 The Economist

📢 🇺🇸 🌐 Marco Rubio: "The world is changing very fast right in front of us. The old world is gone ... We live in a new era in geopolitics, and it's going to require all of us to sort of re-examine what that looks like and what our role is going to be."

📎 State Department

⚓️ 🇺🇸 🇮🇷 With Nimitz decommissioning, the U.S. carrier fleet is effectively down to 10 and stretched thin. Half are in current or upcoming maintenance. Two are deployed, one is forward-deployed, and two are preparing to deploy over the coming weeks and months. Not much room for error.

As I and others have reported for months: USS George H.W. Bush is deploying next from the east coast. According to WSJ, the crew was told to prepare to deploy to the Middle East on a potentially expedited timeline. Surging - at the expense of training - has always been an option.

📎 Ian Ellis

🚨 EPSTEIN FILES: NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC VP AND GHISLAINE'S BOYFRIEND DISCUSSED UNDERWATER PYRAMIDS OFF CUBA

It was only a matter of time before discussion of extraterrestrial life showed up in the Epstein files...

A released 2004 email chain shows Ted Waitt, billionaire Gateway Computers founder and Ghislaine Maxwell's then-boyfriend, forwarding a report from National Geographic EVP Terry Garcia about mysterious underwater megalithic structures off Cuba's coast.

The Cuban geologist's report described structures with "bedrooms and running" areas that "could have been adapted for intelligent beings" and included images of what appeared to be a square stone object and "something resembling a pyramid."

The Epstein circle wasn't just trafficking and finance.

They were apparently funding and exploring underwater ruins off Cuba through National Geographic connections.

Every file opens a stranger door.

Source: EFTA00579280

https://x.com/MarioNawfal/status/2022174755919405273

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