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Exactly. Sanctions against Cuba, Iran and NK have achieved very little. They might even be helping keep the status quo in those countries.
by forinti 5y ago
Exactly. Sanctions against Cuba, Iran and NK have achieved very little. They might even be helping keep the status quo in those countries.
- marcinzm 5y agoYou're assuming the goal is some sort of democratic revolution rather than keeping the economies of those countries constrained so they have less money to spend on weapons.
- s1artibartfast 5y agoInteresting implications for the case of Cuba. If so, their primary crime is being a country in close proximity to the USA. So much for arguments of respecting national autonomy.
- kyleplum 5y agoRefusing to trade with a country is not a violation of their national autonomy.
- yazantapuz 5y agoThis. A lot of people seems to think that the USA bans everyone in the world to trade with cuba, even if they could buy an Havann Club in the store.
- wspess 5y agoWhile USA does not ban everyone from doing trade with Cuba, USA does ban everyone who trades with Cuba from doing trade with the US. You can clearly see how this creates insentives for not trading with Cuba and instead trading with the far larger market next to it.
- yazantapuz 5y agoA lot of countries do international trade with Cuba. USA is not banning everyone who trades with Cuba. I can go to any licor store in my country and buy a bottle of Cuban ron, for example.
- s1artibartfast 5y agoThe US penalizes any country giving foreign aid to Cuba, and prevents its membership in International Financial Institutions like the IMF. Any company in the world doing business in Cuba is also sanctioned by the US and it's employees are barred from entering the US. You may be able to buy a bottle of Cuban rum at your liquor store, but that store can not do business in the US, use US banks, and the senior employees may be barred from traveling to the US. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helms%E2%80%93Burton_Act#Summary https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helms%E2%80%93Burton_Act#Summa...
- kyleplum 5y agoIf Cuba refused to trade with anyone who traded with the US, would you say that Cuba is violating the national autonomy of the US?
- boomboomsubban 5y agoYes, however the severity of the violation is dependent on the influence of the violator. Cuba's violation would be wrong but mostly meaningless compared to the US's.
- kyleplum 5y agoWould it not be a violation of Cuba's National Autonomy to force them to trade with partner's that they did not wish to trade with?
- boomboomsubban 5y agoYes, but I don't see how that's relevant. Not banning trade doesn't force the countries to trade, it just gives them the choice.
- tristor 5y ago> Interesting implications for the case of Cuba. If so, their primary crime is being a country in close proximity to the USA. So much for arguments of respecting national autonomy. I believe their primary crime is being a country in close proximity to the USA, that is unfriendly to US interests, and at least once offered the USSR, a then enemy of the US, to host nuclear ICBMs on their territory so they could more easily target Americans. It’s not like the US randomly and unilaterally decided to sanction Cuba, nor is it like thousands of Cubans fled the country by any means possible to end up seeking asylum in the US for no reason.
- vkou 5y ago> to host nuclear ICBMs on their territory so they could more easily target Americans. ... After the United States invaded it! It's weird that you forget to mention the Bay of Pigs in this history lesson. It's not like Cuba randomly and unilaterally decided to host ICBMs...
- tptacek 5y agoDoesn't matter. Like Clint Eastwood said, "deserve's got nothing to with it".
- vkou 5y agoAnd here I thought that since march of this year, we're of the general impression that countries have the right to defend themselves, and to seek external allies when bullied by a bigger neighbour...
- tptacek 5y agoWe didn't invade after the Cuban Missile Crisis; in fact, Cuba remained closely aligned with the USSR until the end of the USSR. If Russia merely sanctioned Ukraine, nobody would be discussing this. Your rebuttal is facile.
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- nradov 5y agoCuba can have their national autonomy, but other countries have no particular obligation to trade with them. The primary "crime" which originally led to the imposition of sanctions on Cuba was that they nationalized assets owned by US entities without paying compensation. Now you could perhaps make a case that the Cuban government had a moral right to do that, but regardless of who was right of wrong it was certainly contrary to US interests. We don't want to set a precedent for allowing countries to get away with stealing US assets.
- Paradigma11 5y agoCuba was far from an innocent victim but a very active opponent: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_Cuba#Post-revolution_Cuba_(1959%E2%80%93present) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_Cuba#Post-...
- mcguire 5y agoOne might argue that their primary crime is having a few thousand ex-Cubans with outsized political power and a very long grudge. As far as I've seen, no one else cares about Cuba or sanctions.
- babypuncher 5y agoI do not think it is relevant today, but during the Cold War their crime was being all buddy-buddy with the USSR and offering to host some of their nuclear ICBMs. The USSR is long dead though, and nobody is asking Cuba to hold on to WMDs for safe keeping, so the continued sanctions make no real sense in 2022.
- jacquesm 5y ago> The USSR is long dead though Someone is attempting a revival just now.
- tptacek 5y agoWe should end sanctions on Cuba and Iran, and maintain them on North Korea. Consistency is not one of the premises of sanctions.