The US naval base at Guatanamo Bay in Cuba and the Russian naval base at Sebastopol in the Crimea provide a fascinating comparison of historical conquest, land leased, international treaties, cultural independence and democratic rights. So who did the “annexing”?
CUBA AND CRIMEA
Guantanamo Bay Naval Base has been US “territory” since 1898 at the end of the Spanish American War. Following independence from Spain the Cuban Constitution was established in 1901 and in 1903 the USA signed a Lease paying $2,000 per annum to Cuba for Guantanamo Bay.
The Russian Black Sea Fleet is considered to have been founded by Prince Potemkin on May 13, 1783, together with its principal base, Sebastopol which was founded in June 1783 as a base for a naval squadron by Rear Admiral Thomas MacKenzie (Foma Fomich Makenzi), a native Scot in Russian service!
Like Guantanamo Bay’s relationship to Cuba, Sebastopol was a municipality excluded from the adjacent Autonomous Republic of Crimea. In 1997 a long term lease was signed between Russia and Ukraine.
But since the Cuban revolution the USA has occupied Guantanamo Bay by force rather than agreement as the Cuban Government abrogated the Treaty and refused to accept the Americans’ Lease payments.
The Crimea voted overwhelmingly to return to Russia in a referendum in 2014 – and the Crimean population just voted 92% for President Putin in the March 2018 election – whereas there has never been a vote by Cubans on whether they wished Guantanamo Bay to be effective US territory.
So neither Crimea nor Sebastopol have been “annexed” by Russia while Guantanamo Bay has been effectively annexed by the United States. Sebastopol has been Russian since 1783 while Guantanamo Bay has been under US control since 1898. Crimea is predominantly Russian speaking (between 58% and 80%). Cuba is Spanish speaking (90%).
CRIMEA AND SEBASTOPOL
Sebastopol and the Crimea only came under Ukraine after Nikita Kruschev in 1954 (it is said after a good night’s drinking), transferred the territories from the Russian SFSR to being territories of the Ukrainian SSR for administrative purposes.
Sebastopol (after the Greek for a “venerable city”) has a population of 393,000 and was probably named in honour of the Russian Empress Catherine the Great who on her visit in 1784 ordered Grigory Potemkin to build a fortress there. In 1957 the town of Balaclava was incorporated into Sebastopol.
As part of the 1997 Peace and Friendship Treaty between Russia and Ukraine in which Russia ruled out any territorial claims on Ukraine (which Putin continues today in his belief that the Donbas in Eastern Ukraine should be part of Ukraine but autonomous) the long term Lease of land in Sebastopol and the Crimea was agreed. The Ukrainian navy can also use the city’s harbours and piers and both navies headquarter their fleets in the city. There is no Cuban navy in Guantanamo Bay! Cuba runs a light weight coastal defence force from a number of ports.
On 27 April 2010, Russia and Ukraine ratified the Russian Ukrainian Naval Base for Gas treaty, extending the Russian Navy’s lease of Crimean facilities for 25 years after 2017 (through to 2042)
In 2014 a 95% vote in a referendum approved Crimea leaving Ukraine. The short lived “Autonomous Republic of Crimea” was then incorporated into the Russian Federation. Repeated tests of Crimean opinion show overwhelming support for Russia.
The West does not recognise the democratic vote of Crimeans to re-join Russia but they recognise (along with a minority of the world’s nations) the independence of Muslim Kosovo from Serbia. The EU and the US don’t give Crimeans visas, unless they go to Western embassies in Kiev in Ukraine (which is waging a bloody war to stop Eastern Ukrainians in the Donbas from achieving autonomy within Ukraine). Kosovans do not have to go through Belgrade of course to get visas!
GUANTANAMO BAY
The USA occupied Cuba after victory in the Spanish American War in 1898 and leased the land “to maintain the Independence of Cuba”. The Lease was signed in 1903 at $2,000 a year and renewed in 1974 at $4,085 a year. There are today 9,500 US sailors and marines at the base – plus of course the “prisoners of war” from the “war on terror” and in particular the start of the Afghanistan War in 2001.
President Obama promised to close the military prison but never did. President Trump has vowed to keep it open.
Cuba still regards the land as illegally occupied and no lease payments have been accepted from the USA since 1960. Although the Cubans have a cast iron moral case and there is specific prohibition of coercion in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties which would invalidate the original treaty, nevertheless the Vienna Convention – signed long after the first lease of Guantanamo Bay – cannot be applied retro-actively!
Of course the defeated power in 1898 was Spain and the annexation to “preserve Cuba’s independence” is an absurd argument. There has been no vote on the control of Guantanamo Bay by its population nor by Cubans. Cubans do not of course vote in US presidential elections! And if they had it is doubtful that President Trump would have received the 92% support that President Putin got from the people of Crimea!
SUMMARY
So history, land leases, democratic justification, cultural and linguistic characteristics and the moral case would give Russian claims to Sebastopol and Crimea the international high ground over the US occupation of Guantanamo Bay. So who did the “annexing” ?
