The extraction of Nicolás Maduro from the Miraflores Palace in January 2026 was a tactical masterstroke for Western security, but a strategic victory remains elusive. While the head of the snake in Caracas has been severed, the venom remains in the system.
For the last decade, Venezuela has not acted alone; it was the central banker for a trans-regional “Axis of Resistance” that linked the neo-Ottoman ambitions of Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Turkey, the theocratic expansionism of Iran, and the tenacious survivalism of Communist Cuba. With the Venezuelan patron removed, the United States must now pivot immediately to the next domino: the Republic of Cuba.
To understand the urgency, one must look past the crumbling facades of Old Havana to the harbor, where the true guarantor of the Cuban regime currently floats. As of early 2026, a fleet of Turkish “Karpowerships” – floating power plants owned by the Istanbul-based Karadeniz Holding – provides approximately 25% of Cuba’s electricity.
These vessels are the difference between rolling blackouts and total regime collapse. For years, the bill for this lifeline was effectively footed by Caracas, utilizing a complex laundering mechanism known as the “Gold Bridge” where Venezuelan bullion was flown to Turkey to be refined and monetized.
With Maduro in US custody and the “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine back in force, the financial architecture of this alliance is crumbling. The question Washington must ask is simple: If Venezuela can no longer pay the Turks, who will? And more importantly, why is a NATO member permitted to provide the energy security for a state sponsor of terrorism located 90 miles from Key West?
The stakes have risen dramatically following “Operation Rising Lion” in June 2025. Israel’s decisive preemptive campaign against Iranian nuclear and ballistic capabilities degraded the Islamic Republic’s power projection in the Levant. In response, Tehran has accelerated its pivot to Latin America, seeking “strategic depth” in the Western Hemisphere to threaten the US homeland. Intelligence reports indicate that following the degradation of Hezbollah’s command structure in Lebanon, operatives have increasingly utilized the permissive environments of Venezuela and Cuba to regroup.
Cuba is no longer merely a romanticized relic of the Cold War; it is a forward operating base for America’s enemies. Recent satellite imagery of the Bejucal SIGINT facility confirms that China has upgraded its eavesdropping capabilities, allowing the PLA to monitor US military communications across the Caribbean. Simultaneously, the regime in Havana has adopted a virulent, state-sponsored antisemitism, leading diplomatic pogroms against Israel at the UN.
Erdogan uses Venezuelan gold to prop up economy
The vulnerability of this axis lies in its wallet. Turkey’s involvement in the Caribbean was never about ideology; it was about profit and leverage. Erdogan utilized the Venezuelan gold trade to prop up his own shaky economy while positioning Ankara as an indispensable broker for rogue regimes. The Karadeniz Holding contract with Cuba is a commercial venture, not a charity. In 2023, the company ruthlessly cut power to Freetown, Sierra Leone, over an unpaid $40 million debt.
This presents a clear mechanism for regime change that does not require a single boot on the ground. The United States Treasury must make the continued operation of Turkish vessels in Cuban waters financially untenable. By designating the specific vessels or their parent companies under existing counter-terrorism or Helms-Burton authorities, Washington can force the insurers and bankers behind Karadeniz Holding to pull the plug.
Without the Turkish ships, the Cuban energy grid – decrepit, Soviet-era, and starving for fuel – cannot sustain the demands of the military-tourism complex run by the powerful Cuban military-controlled conglomerate GAESA. A collapse in power generation would paralyze the regime’s surveillance apparatus and likely trigger a repeat of the July 2021 protests, this time with no Venezuelan cash to buy loyalty.
Turkey cannot have it both ways. It cannot claim the security guarantees of NATO while its flagship companies provide the electricity that powers Chinese spy bases and shelters Hezbollah financiers in the Caribbean. The fall of Caracas has exposed the fragility of the authoritarian network in the Americas. The “Gold Bridge” is closed.
It is time to turn off the lights in Havana and force the Iranian and Chinese squatters out of the hemisphere. The liberation of Cuba is not just a moral imperative for the Cuban people – it is a strategic necessity for the security of the United States.
The writer, a fellow at the Middle East Forum, is a policy analyst and writer based in Morocco. Follow him on X: @amineayoubx.