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Fifty years after the triumph of the Cuban Revolution and the establishment of a Marxist-Leninist regime in Cuba, the two fundamental dimensions of this historical phenomenon are the survival of the system created by Fidel Castro and the policy of the United States to terminate it.

This article tackles two key issues: the US-EU Understanding on the Helms-Burton Law, & what Roy calls the Helms-Burton Doctrine. As to the former, Roy stresses that while the European Union (EU) has denounced the Cuban government for violating human rights in the island, it has also rejected the unilateral actions taken by the US, eg, the Helms-Burton Law. When the EU decided to denounce the law at the WTO, the US replied that the accusation was unacceptable since the nature of the issue was not commercial but political. However, the US & the EU reached an Understanding whereby the US government would require the Congress to loosen Article III & remove Article IV of the Law, while the EU agreed to discourage investments in the expropriated properties, support Cuba's democratization process, & withdraw its claim at the WTO, among other things. The Understanding did not go without criticisms both in the US & the EU, but it soon became a model of diplomatic negotiations, which were feasible due to the fact that Cuba was not so important an issue as to start out a trade war between the two giants. Roy also argues that the Helms-Burton Act may be construed as a doctrine since it includes a series of political requirements to lift the embargo that actually entail a blueprint for Cuba's future government. These requirements include forbidding all members of the Castro family from holding any position in the government; holding open elections with the participation of independent political parties, monitored by the UN & the OAS, & establishing an independent judiciary. On the grounds of the political leverage that the US government intends to have on Cuba, Roy draws a continuity line that goes back to the Monroe Doctrine & the Platt Amendment, & argues that the Helms-Burton Law represents for Cuba, in fact, a domestic political issue. Adapted from the source document.

This article analyzes the Helms-Burton law & links it with US policy toward Cuba. It explains that this law is not new, but the updating of the Monroe Doctrine & Platt Amendment, & is in agreement with the current relationship between the two countries. The author highlights that the Helms-Burton law is an evident example of the US's ideology not only toward Cuba, but toward Latin America in general, & maybe the whole world. He refers to the main points of this law & analyzes the circumstances that the US government demands in order to remove the economic seizure, & emphasizes those that must be done to create a new Cuban government & to establish a democratic regime. Finally, he suggests that the Helms-Burton law has benefited the Cuban government instead of changing it. Adapted from the source document.

Professor Joaquin Roy, a Spaniard with valuable sources throughout Europe, notes that Europeans apparently do not approve of the seeming U.S. emphasis on providing military equipment and training to Colombia for a counternarcotics effort in what they see as a larger strategic political conflict. At the same time, he reports that Europeans are not only concerned with the counternarcotics violence in Colombia, but also with the economic, security, and political spillover effects for neighboring countries. Finally and logically, the author reflects the European concern that whatever contribution that might be made to Plan Colombia will likely be lost in the violence of a U.S.-led counternarcotics campaign. ; https://press.armywarcollege.edu/monographs/1838/thumbnail.jpg