Profs and Pints DC presents: “Cuba, Our Closest Enemy,” on our country’s volatile relationship with an island nation off Florida’s coast, with William M. LeoGrande, professor of government at American University and leading expert on U.S.-Cuban relations.
The United States and Cuba are fractious neighbors who can’t get along but can’t move away from one another. From Fidel Castro’s defiant revolution to Donald Trump’s “Donroe Doctrine” asserting U.S. dominance in the Western Hemisphere, U.S. relations with Cuba have been acrimonious, tumultuous, and often dangerous—marked by invasion, attempted assassinations, nuclear confrontation, and half a century of economic warfare.
Gain a deeper understanding of relationships between the two countries with Dr. William LeoGrande, widely recognized as one of the nation’s foremost experts on Cuban politics and U.S. policy toward the island, having authored or edited seven books on the subject, including Back Channel to Cuba: The Hidden History of Negotiations between Washington and Havana.
Professor LeoGrande’s talk will chronicle the trajectory of this unique relationship of “perpetual hostility,” as Henry Kissinger called it, from confrontations to secret talks aimed at reconciliation.
We’ll see how America’s playground of the 1950s became a cold war ally of the Soviet Union and how Cuban refugees became a powerful force in American politics. We’ll look at how the end of the cold war changed U.S.-Cuban relations—or didn’t—and how repeated attempts at rapprochement failed to rebuild the bridges that had burned in the early days of Cuba’s revolution.
Since Fidel Castro left center stage in 2006, U.S.-Cuban relations have lurched back and forth at stomach-churning velocity. Professor LeoGrande, who has advised Congress on Cuba as a member of its foreign policy staff, will explore the stories behind the headlines. You’ll learn how changes from Republican to Democratic presidents produced radical swings in relations between Washington and Havana, most dramatically between President Barack Obama’s attempt to normalize relations and Donald Trump’s threats to bankrupt or invade the island. (Advance tickets: $13.50 plus sales tax and processing fees. Doors: $17, or $15 with a student ID. Listed time is for doors. Talk starts 30 minutes later.)