How come the USA has a military base in Cuba? Can Cuba get rid of it?
U.S. Naval Base Guantanamo Bay is the oldest U.S. base overseas and the only one in a Communist country. Located in the Oriente Province on the southeast corner of Cuba, the base is about 400 air miles from Miami, Florida. In February 1903, the United States agreed to lease 45 square miles of land and water at Guantanamo Bay for use as a coaling station. The treaty was finalized and the document was ratified by both governments and signed in Havana in December of that year. A 1934 treaty reaffirming the lease granted Cuba and her trading partners free access through the bay, modified the lease payment from $2,000 in gold coins per year, to the 1934 equivalent value of $4,085 U.S. Treasury Dollars, and added a requirement that termination of the lease requires the consent of both the U.S. and Cuba governments, or the abandonment of the base property by the U.S. Base relations with Cuba remained stable through two world wars and the periods between and did not significantly change until
