After historic diplomatic gains, Cuba announces military exercises after Trump election win.

Donald Trump’s victory has sent America’s allies and adversaries scrambling to decipher what a real-life Trump presidency might mean for their relationships with the U.S. One early indicator of the anxiety and anticipation that the U.S.’s interaction with its regional and global partners is set to change is Cuba’s almost immediate decision to hold five days of military exercises to “maintain the country’s defense preparedness.”

The Cuban government did not explicitly link the nationwide “Bastion Strategic Exercise” to Trump’s election, but the military drills in the past have been ordered during contentious periods with the U.S. “The first Bastion Strategic Exercise was launched in 1980 after the election of Ronald Reagan as U.S. president,” according to the Associated Press.

Cuban concern for a Trump presidency comes after Obama ushered in new era of normalization after 50 years of silence between the two nations. On the campaign trail, however, Trump has threatened to reverse the gains of the past two years, including the unwinding of economic sanctions and other vestiges of the Cold War rivalry. Trump declared the U.S./Cuba deal a “very weak agreement,” which has historically been Trumpspeak for I don’t actually know anything about this subject, but I’m sure it’s bad.Whether it was campaign bluster or not is impossible to know for sure. “I like the idea of an agreement, but it has to be a real agreement,” Trump said just weeks before the election. Facing a new geopolitical reality, Cuba understandably appears to be looking to strengthen its hand.

Tweet Share Share Comment

• Cuba