Cuba is left reeling in the aftermath of the Venezuela strike

For months as the US military prepared to strike Venezuela, many Cubans have asked me a simple, if disconcerting, question: “Are we next?”

Following the devastating attacks on Venezuelan military bases and surgical apprehension of leader Nicolás Maduro by US Special Forces, Cuba seems very much in the Trump administration’s sights.

Maduro’s capture is a seismic reversal of fortune for Cuba’s communist-run government, which for decades has relied on massive aid packages from its oil-rich South American ally for the island’s very survival.

At a protest Saturday in front of the US Embassy in Havana, a defiant Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel promised not to let the Cuba-Venezuela alliance go down without a fight.

“For Venezuela, of course for Cuba, we are willing to give even our own life, but at a heavy cost,” Diaz-Canel proclaimed.