Senior defense officials looking at Cuba military options
Military planners have examined options for possible action against Cuba, including an Army-led air assault involving the 101st Airborne Division.
Updated on: July 15, 2026 / 2:53 PM EDT / CBS News
Washington — As the U.S.-Iran war restarts following the collapse of the weeks-long ceasefire, senior Pentagon officials are also quietly eyeing another flashpoint much closer to home: Cuba.
The officials, who spoke to CBS News under condition of anonymity to discuss national security matters, stressed that the briefings are not an indication that President Trump or the Pentagon have decided to carry out an operation.
Any operation against Cuba would confront the Pentagon with a significant problem because much of the U.S. military's attention and some of its most valuable offensive capabilities are already committed elsewhere. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has emphasized that the U.S. prefers a diplomatic option for a transition to a new government led by technocrats and willing to make economic reforms. That process has stalled, despite tightening financial pressure around the Cuban military and its conglomerate GAESA, the sprawling, military-controlled holding company which the United States refers to as an $18 billion trust fund. In a July 11 statement , Rubio said that so far, the regime and its "corrupt elites" continue to refuse reform, instead "perpetuating their total control" and adherence to a "morally bankrupt Marxist ideology."
The State Department announced that it has also tightened the financial vice around Cuba's state-owned entities that "funnel revenue to the regime and paramilitary forces" that repress the Cuban people, including rapid response brigades.