Cuba is counting the cost of the alliance after 32 troops were killed in Venezuela

From sunrise, crowds of military personnel, government officials and civilians lined the route between Havana’s airport and the Armed Forces Ministry to applaud the remains of 32 Cuban troops who died in Venezuela as they passed in a funeral cortege.

The country’s leadership – from Raul Castro to President Miguel Diaz Canel – was at the airport to receive the caskets carrying the cremated ashes of their “32 fallen heroes”.

In the lobby of the ministry building, each box is placed in a Cuban flag and placed next to a photo of the respective soldier or intelligence officer under the words “honor and glory”.

But despite the magnificence and full credit of the military, it was a sobering experience for the Cuban Revolution.

First, it is believed to be the largest loss of Cuban combatants at the hands of the US military since the Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961. The fact that six and a half decades have passed with almost no comparable combat between Cuban and US troops, either during the Cold War or after, shows how extraordinary it is.

It should come as no surprise that the better-trained and better-equipped soldiers of the Delta Force emerged largely unscathed, especially given their elite reputation within the world’s most powerful military.

But that was of no comfort to the grieving family members as they wept as they placed their hands on the wooden boxes in Havana.

Moreover, in the days following the US military intervention in Venezuela and the forced removal of Nicolas Maduro from power, the Cuban Government was obliged to admit something it had long denied: the very existence of Cuban intelligence officials within the corridors of power in Caracas.

Now it is clear, as it has been admitted for many years in Venezuela, that Cubans are at every level of the country’s security apparatus and that bilateral intelligence arrangements are an important part of Cuba-Venezuela relations.

In short, the Cuban Government has shared years of experience on how best to maintain an iron grip on power with its Venezuelan partners. The 32 deaths on Venezuelan soil are part of the shared strategy.

However, after their deaths, Cubans will feel the sands shifting beneath their feet. A day earlier, the interim president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodriguez, had a phone call with President Trump, after which he described him as “a terrible person”.

Rewind the clock just three weeks and it’s almost unthinkable to hear such praise from the same administration that painted its predecessor as running an entire regime of “narco-terrorists.”

It looks like Rodriguez and the Trump administration are looking for a modus vivendi. But few in the Cuban government seem to understand where that leaves them or their shared vision of state-run socialism in Venezuela.

Washington insists that the days are numbered for the Cuban Revolution.

However, one of the “original generation” disagrees. At age 88, Victor Dreke was a contemporary of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, and said the current US conflict has echoes of the CIA-backed Bay of Pigs invasion in April 1961.

He led two companies of Cuban troops that day and argued that the Cubans would still reject any repeat attempt:

“If the US tries to invade, they will stir up a hornet’s nest,” he said, quoting Raul Castro. “They never see our warriors coming, men and women.”

“If the Americans set foot on Cuban soil, it will not be like their cowardly ambush of our fighters in Venezuela”, he said. “Out here, things are very different.”

For the past few days, Cuban state television has shown images of civilian reservists receiving weapons training from the Cuban military.

In fact, when fighting against the US military, it is an unfair fight. The US attack on Venezuela was intended, in part, to emphasize the point in the region.

The stakes for Cuba are extremely high.

The island experienced widespread blackouts that were worse in Havana but worse in the provinces. The economy, battered by the US economic embargo and government mismanagement, is limping at best. Gasoline is scarce and the engine of the economy, tourism, has yet to recover from pre-pandemic levels.

It is in the complex picture that Cubans try to imagine the imminent loss of Venezuelan support. This feels to many like a bleak scenario.

But the former commander, Victor Dreke, is adamant that Cuba has weathered difficult times in the past and can do so again with enough revolutionary enthusiasm.

Cuba does not want any conflict with the Trump administration, he insisted, and will not seek to escalate matters in Washington.

“But that doesn’t mean we’re not ready”, he added, defiantly.