The images were historic: CIA Director John Ratcliffe standing alongside Cuban government officials, with no more context than a mention of the location, Havana. The message, however, required no explanation: the visit last week by the public face of an institution long associated with countless real and imagined plots against Cuba suggests that time is up for the island’s communist regime.

A new round of aggressive US sanctions unveiled on Monday comes amid growing frustration in Washington with the Cuban leadership and rising speculation about possible military strikes. After nearly seven decades in power, the Cuban dictatorship as we know it is closer than ever to an irreversible breaking point. The Trump administration seems committed to pursuing regime change, perhaps even more so as it struggles to secure a decisive outcome in Iran and searches for a clear geopolitical victory elsewhere.

Whatever demands the White House delivered behind closed doors in Havana, Ratcliffe’s public warning is worth heeding: don’t repeat the mistake Nicolás Maduro made in Venezuela and underestimate President Donald Trump’s expansionist ambitions.

Even if parts of the Cuban leadership would prefer martyrdom, the most rational course would be to accept the sweeping reforms Washington is demanding: the release of political prisoners, a path for political opening, measures to strengthen the private sector and some degree of geopolitical realignment. The US would want to see preferential treatment to American firms too.

In exchange for sanctions relief, financial support and perhaps safe passage into exile for some top figures, the regime would have to abandon doctrines that sustained the Castro revolution for decades. That’s a humiliating prospect for such a fiercely nationalist movement.

Viable alternatives have largely vanished. Havana foolishly spurned the far better deal offered by President Barack Obama’s administration, when relations briefly thawed. If Cuban officials now need advice on reconciling realpolitik with Marxist rhetoric, they could ask former ally and fresh American enthusiast Delcy Rodríguez for a few tips.

Cuba’s lack of options is compounded by its growing geopolitical isolation, deep economic fragility and the cruel oil embargo imposed by the US earlier this year. Venezuela was, until recently, Cuba’s last major benefactor, but crude flows stopped after Maduro’s fall and Rodriguez’s abrupt rapprochement with Washington.

While the Cuban revolution still carries enormous symbolic weight for leftist movements across Latin America and the world, few governments seem willing to confront Trump over what’s already a lost cause. Russia is consumed by its increasingly costly war in Ukraine. China appears to view this ageing brand of revolutionary socialism as a relic of another era. Beijing would probably be the first to lecture Havana on the virtues of state-led capitalism.

The second major problem facing the Cuban elite is the administration’s unbridled willingness to target its adversaries with sanctions and indictments. From the extradition of Maduro’s scandal-ridden financier Alex Saab to the indictment of the governor of Mexico’s Sinaloa state, US courts can sometimes inflict more personal damage than military conflict.

The legal threat hanging over former President Raúl Castro, still the regime’s ultimate power broker at nearly 95, and his inner circle could be a powerful promoter of change: Washington is reportedly preparing an indictment against Castro that could be unveiled this week. The US also just sanctioned GAESA, the military-run conglomerate that functions as a state within a state, along with a Cuban-Canadian mining venture refining nickel and cobalt.

The Cuban government has now been forced to admit the country has run out of diesel and fuel oil amid rolling blackouts and a resurgence of angry street protests. On the ground, authorities are already preparing the population for a foreign military intervention.

CNN revealed that the US military has carried out dozens of intelligence-gathering flights near Cuba’s largest cities since February; the regime has reportedly purchased attack drones to launch against the US base at Guantanamo. Polymarket currently places the odds of US military action before year’s end at 45 per cent, up from 35 per cent a month ago.

Yet a prolonged armed conflict would be disastrous for both sides, not least because the US has never truly mastered the art of manufacturing democracies by force. A more transactional approach is required, one shaped by Washington’s escalating pressure campaign that will probably involve the kind of tactical surprise seen with Maduro’s extraction at the start of 2026.

While Cuba and Venezuela differ in crucial ways, the White House may attempt a similar formula in Havana: a new face managing much of the old system, at least temporarily, so long as it aligns with Washington’s strategic interests.

More executor than negotiator, Ratcliffe delivered another message during his brief visit to Havana: the US is prepared to engage seriously with the Cuban government on economic and security matters — but only once it accepts fundamental change.

That offer deserves serious consideration. To end the hardships afflicting its 11 million people, Cuba needs to overhaul its political and economic systems for its own sake, not simply because a foreign power demands it. The utopian promise of a fully egalitarian socialist society died long ago, leaving behind just an authoritarian kleptocracy. At some point, reality catches up even with the sturdiest of revolutions.

· JP Spinetto is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering Latin American business, economic affairs and politics