On Friday, a patrol ship of the Canadian Navy arrived in Cuba, the home of two nuclear-powered submarines, one American and one Russian.
After “a successful deployment in the Caribbean basin,” the Royal Canadian Navy posted on Facebook that the HMCS Margaret Brooke has moored in Havana.
The Canadian delegation “will conduct a port visit to Havana from June 14 to 17, 2024, in recognition of the long-standing bilateral relationship between Canada and Cuba,” it stated.
According to the statement, it was the Navy’s first trip to Cuba and Havana since 2018.
A US nuclear-powered submarine arrived in Cuba, the Pentagon said Thursday, a day after a Russian nuclear sub also docked there.
The fast-attack submarine USS Helena was in Guantanamo Bay as part of a routine port visit, previously planned, the US Southern Command said.
Arriving at the Cuban capital on Wednesday was the Russian nuclear-powered sub Kazan, which Cuba claimed was not carrying nuclear weapons.
Admiral Gorshkov’s frigate, an oil tanker, and a salvage tug were all in tow.
The unique Russian deployment occurred in the midst of high tensions over the conflict in Ukraine, where the government supported by the West is battling a Russian invasion, only 90 miles off the coast of Florida.
The Russian ships were under observation, according to the US military, and they did not directly threaten anyone.
Cuba was a significant client state of the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
The deployment of Soviet nuclear missile sites on the island triggered the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, when Washington and Moscow came close to war.
