Cuba Prepares to Repel Possible US Attack After Trump Floats Military Action

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel said on Friday that Cuba is preparing to repel any foreign military attack on the island, a day after US President Donald Trump said he would "certainly consider" a short military campaign against Havana and declared he wants to "get Cuba done" before leaving office. Speaking at a National Defense Day session in Boyeros, a municipality south of Havana, Díaz-Canel said: "We have the decision to reject any attempt at foreign military aggression against our country, and we are preparing for that."

Trump made the remarks in a telephone interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt on Thursday, describing Cuba as a "failed" state and saying his administration was monitoring the situation "very closely". He said Secretary of State Marco Rubio, whose parents emigrated from Cuba, "would love to do it", and he repeated his prediction from a White House news conference on Monday that the Cuban government would "fall fairly soon". Rubio had earlier urged Cubans seeking change to pursue what he called "a discrete partnership with the CIA".

Díaz-Canel stressed that Cuba is a peaceful country that threatens no nation and poses no threat to US national security, while pointing to the nationwide Moncada 2026 strategic exercise held the previous week and weekly defence sessions as evidence of its preparations. The standoff follows a US military operation in Venezuela in January that removed President Nicolás Maduro, and an oil blockade that has deepened Cuba's fuel shortages and blackouts. According to US officials cited in earlier reporting, Washington is not preparing an imminent attack on Cuba, despite the president's repeated threats.