CBS News: US Navy ships will monitor the exercises of the Russian fleet off Cuba
The U.S. Navy will monitor Russian ships heading to the port of Havana, CBS News reports. At the same time, according to American officials, Washington does not see a threat in the upcoming exercises in the Caribbean.
Three Russian ships and one nuclear submarine are due to arrive in Cuba this week to conduct military exercises in the Caribbean Sea. These exercises do not pose a threat to the United States, but America has sent its navy to monitor the Russians, as American representatives told CBS News.
Russian warships are due to arrive in Havana on Wednesday and will remain there until next Monday, the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. An American official told CBS News correspondent David Martin that, according to estimates by the US intelligence community, the submarine from the incoming group has a nuclear power plant, but does not carry weapons of mass destruction on board.
"We have no information or evidence that a scenario with nuclear weapons will be played out at these exercises or that they will be on board these ships," John Kirby, strategic communications coordinator at the National Security Council, told CBS News senior White House political correspondent Ed O'Keefe last week (John Kirby).
Which Russian ships will arrive in Cuba?
According to the Cuban Foreign Ministry, a Russian frigate, a fuel tanker and a rescue tug will arrive for the exercises. Three ships and a submarine will pass through the Atlantic Ocean separately, an American official told Martin.
The submarine is being monitored by two American destroyers and two ships with towed sonar. Another destroyer and a U.S. Coast Guard cutter are following three Russian ships.
According to the Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs, one of the arriving Russian ships will greet Cuba with a 21-gun salvo. After that, Moscow will begin conducting air and naval exercises in the Caribbean in the coming weeks, as Martin was informed by another American source.
Long-range bombers will also take part in the exercises. According to the American representative, these will be Russia's first aviation and naval maneuvers in the Caribbean since 2019. The exercises will be held in the summer, and their culmination will be the autumn international naval maneuvers.
"Of course, they are signaling their dissatisfaction with what we are doing for Ukraine," Kirby said. — So we will be watching, we will be watching them. There is no surprise here. But we do not expect, we do not expect that there will be an immediate or any threat to American national security in this region, in the Caribbean region or anywhere else."
The American representative told Martin that these ships could also arrive in Venezuela.
What was the Caribbean crisis?
These events in the Caribbean Sea zone are significantly different from the Caribbean missile crisis that occurred more than 60 years ago. It happened in 1962, when the United States discovered launch pads for Soviet ballistic nuclear missiles in Cuba.
In 13 days, this crisis brought the USSR and the United States to the brink of nuclear war. The conflict was averted when the Kennedy administration concluded an agreement with the Kremlin on the withdrawal of missiles from Cuba.
By Alex Sundby
