To be honest, I don’t really give a crap about pro-US—what I mean by reasonable is less repressive and more democratic and also not inclined to support violent revolution elsewhere.

France and Germany, for example, are open, tolerant, and democratic even though public opinion is currently anti-US. If we ended up with a democratic Cuba whose citizens, on the whole, didn’t like the US, that’d be fine.

Indeed, I am not an expert on the outcomes of Swiss elections, despite my ancestry. Similarly, yet shockingly, many Cuban-Americans aren’t Cuban-born. And who’s to say a newly-democratic Cuba would allow a “right of return” to families that (1) supported the previous dictator, and (2) would be returning in an attempt to take property from its current owners?

I suspect their opinions are a bit more based on expert knowledge.

If by “reasonable” you mean pro-US I think you’ll be sorely disappointed in any case. If I was a Cuban of any ideological hue I wouldn’t be forgiving the US any time soon.

I think a post-Castro Cuban government is more, not less, likely to be anti-US if it is democratic – a principle that in other contexts (especially the ME) many Americans seem very slow to understand.

Which is what I said. The profits that acrue from ownership of the fields will go to Cuba. As for the profits that acrue from the dev contracts—why would Castro award dev contracts to U.S. oil firms (under scenario #2) unless other concessions were forthcoming (e.g. complete end of the embargo)?

But even then, consider—if Cuba is really soon to be awash in petrodollars, Castro should prefer to keep the embargo (and the U.S. bogeyman) in place, and avoid the ‘corrupting’ influences of expanded U.S. trade. I really don’t see any likely scenario where Castro would award development contracts to U.S. firms in preference to others. So long as the communist government is in place, I don’t forsee any great profit opportunities for U.S. energy companies regardless of any changes in the embargo.

Yes, long-term contracts matter, and so does transport cost. It would make economic sense for Cuban oil to go to the U.S. rather than more distant markets. The embargo may be, indeed, be relaxed to allow this (as it was to allow agricultural exports to Cuba). If this happens it will be at market rates for long-term contracts. But this would not result in any particular profit windfall for U.S. oil companies. Shrug.

The worst of it for the U.S. is not that the U.S. doesn’t control the oil, it’s that Castro does—and the probability of communist government being replaced by something more reasonable when Castro is gone is diminished if the government suddenly has a major new source of funds. Conversely, as we’re seeing with Chavez, the probability is that Cuba will make a nuisance of itself with renewed vigor once it is pumped up on $70+ oil.

They were importing some Russian oil – but not enough:

At the outbreak of the war, Germany’s stockpiles of fuel consisted of a total of 15 million barrels. The campaigns in Norway, Holland, Belgium, and France added another 5 million barrels in booty, and imports from the Soviet Union accounted for 4 million barrels in 1940 and 1.6 million barrels in the first half of 1941. Yet a High Command study in May of 1941 noted that with monthly military requirements for 7.25 million barrels and imports and home production of only 5.35 million barrels, German stocks would be exhausted by August 1941. The 26 percent shortfall could only be made up with petroleum from Russia. The need to provide the lacking 1.9 million barrels per month and the urgency to gain possession of the Russian oil fields in the Caucasus mountains, together with Ukrainian grain and Donets coal, were thus prime elements in the German decision to invade the Soviet Union in June 1941.

While oil may be fungible, the PROFITS from oil are not. That, and only that, is what this is about. Will the profits to be made from this development accrue to those dirty smelly Europeans, Russians and Chinese, or to poor hardworking decent American executives?

To get a sense of how much that is, I had a look at the BP Statistical Review of World Energy,. This gives US reserves as 29.3 bn barrels, Venezuela’s as 79.7; Mexico’s as 14.8; and Norway’s as 9.7.

Some back-of-the-envelope: If Cuba can sustain the same rate of production out of these new finds as Mexico (3.759 mbd) or Norway (2.969 mbd), it will be a significant oil exporter indeed. If we assume per capita consumption as high as that of the US, its 11.4 m people will only use around 0.8 mbd. If instead we assume a Venezuelan rate of consumption, Cubans will only use 0.25 mbd themselves, potentially allowing exports of maybe 2 mbd. In 2005 US imports stood at 10 mbd. Total exports from the Middle East was 17.4 mbd.

The problem with Florida is the major tourist industry: no one there will want to see that damaged by having oil rigs in views and greasy stuff washing up on the shore. I can’t imagine the Floridians then building the pipeline and risking one of the state’s biggest assets.

The good news(?) for Cuba is that new oil will help keep the communist dream alive for them. Welcome to a new world of socialist, oil rich Latin America…?