True but having nukes or a nuclear weapons program isn't the bar for having devasting sanctions placed on you by western nations these days, merely not being a vassal is. Cuba has no nuclear weapons program and has done absolutely nothing to the United States for decades and the US is still starving them anyway just for being communist.

Yes, it would, but the alternative is the US invading and taking over Cuba with minimal consequences. The US government and military establishment have spelled it out in a crystal clear fashion they are on global crusade to purge socialism militarily and they should be taken at their word as much as Hitler should of when he wrote his thoughts about the bolsheviks in Mein Kampf. And it pains me to say it but Nuclear weapons are truly the only viable defense in Cuba's case. Cuba doesn't have the robust ballistic missile and drones manufacturing that Iran has and a committed attack by the US would be extremely one sided. We can talk about the Bay of Pigs and Vietnam but the factors aren't identical. The Bay of Pigs was a suicide incursion done by rabid Gusanos that the US merely supported rather then an actual US military campaign, Vietnam had a steady stream of supplies and support from China and the USSR to keep them fighting into perpetuality. The best leverage Cuba has would be to strike shipping and oil assets in the Gulf but again they lack the missiles and drones to do that like Iran can.