Natalie Kitroeff

Right.

You're saying basically that a corner has been turned in Cuba.

After years and years of suffering, there may be a kind of change coming.

And what we understand from your reporting and from, honestly, the public statements of the administration is that this crisis that Cuba is facing now is intentional.

It's the result of a carefully planned policy, right, by the Trump administration.

Can you just lay out for me why?

Why has the U.S.

been so dead set on toppling the regime in Cuba?

So near total isolation.

And you're saying Fidel Castro actually encouraged this.

He said, please leave.

These boats can go wherever you want them to.

Don't stay here.

In just thinking about the history that you've sketched out here, it feels like at every turn, the U.S.

thought that it was creating the conditions that would internally, you know, force people to rise up inside of Cuba, that it would force change from within by creating this pressure cooker.

But...

The Cuban regime responded to that by saying, well, it's not a pressure cooker if we have a valve and that valve is sending people to the United States, basically exporting the people who are most likely to push for change from within.

So back in Cuba, the regime has survived this special period, but they've lost their biggest benefactor in the Soviet Union.

So what do they do?

The idea from the Obama administration at the time was, okay, sticks have not worked in Cuba for like half a century, so we should try something else.