Should the United States make Canada the 51st state? Take over the Panama Canal? Co-opt Greenland? Appropriate Gaza and expel over two million Gazans to make it the Riviera of the Middle East? All these ideas have been floated recently, but another one is much more feasible, with land the US already has: make Guantanamo into a global capital.

Today, Guantanamo Bay bears the scars of colonial ambition, Cold War dread, and global torture — a relic of a bygone era. But there’s nothing stopping us from building a new Hong Kong, Dubai, or Singapore there, just a couple hundred miles off the coast of Miami. It could be an international capital of trade, finance, and tourism — a bright city on the bay. And in the process, we could show the Cuban population what capitalism can achieve.

This is Guantanamo Bay. Today, it’s a military base. The bay has a well-protected deep water port and two landing strips for planes.

And crucially, it’s in the middle of busy sea trade routes.

Could it become the Singapore, the Hong Kong, the Dubai of the Caribbean?

21st century global cities

These cities were backwaters not so long ago.

Hong Kong was a deep water port surrounded by a communist country, China. By building up the port, urbanizing the surrounding area, making business easy, and minimizing taxes, Hong Kong showed China what capitalism could do by becoming a global port, trading hub, and financial center.

Seeing this success, Deng Xiaoping (China’s forward-thinking leader in the late 70s and 80s) made the neighboring Shenzhen into a special economic zone (SEZ). The area exploded and is now an epicenter of global manufacturing, along with the broader Guangzhou, on the Pearl River delta.

Singapore has a similar story.

When Singapore was expelled from Malaysia, it was not a global hub. But it was in the middle of one of the busiest trade routes in the world.

And it capitalized on its location by building a port, reducing taxes, and then expanding services to encourage more trade, finance, and tourism.

Dubai is an even more recent example of the same recipe.

It was always a small regional port, but in the 20th century it reduced taxes, built one of the best ports in the region, built more infrastructure, and became a trade, finance, and tourism hub.

Can we do the same with Guantanamo?

The case for Guantanamo

Three factors could help make this happen.

First, many of the most successful cities start as military outposts, providing security, infrastructure, and demand for services to kick-start the local economy. That’s what the US military is providing as Guantanamo Bay’s anchor tenant.

Second, Guantanamo Bay could also become a trading hub thanks to its deep water port in the middle of shipping lanes. But there’s intense competition: Panama already has two big ports, one on each side — Pacific and Atlantic — and the US ports of New Orleans, Houston, Corpus Christi, and Miami are close by and quite big. But none are centrally located in the Caribbean. And all the US ports have a big problem: the Jones Act.

The Jones Act requires ships carrying passengers or goods between US ports to be made in the US, flagged by the US, and crewed by US citizens. This is useful to ensure the US has a navy in times of war, as it would keep its shipbuilding facilities. Still, it’s quite expensive. A ship going from Panama to New Orleans to drop some cargo can’t then go to Miami and drop more cargo, or pick up new cargo in New Orleans for Puerto Rico. But if Guantanamo was set up as a special economic zone (SEZ), select federal laws could be locally suspended. Guantanamo Bay would then become the US port in the Caribbean, serving as a base for all other ports without dramatically impacting the American shipbuilding business.

Third, Guantanamo City would have a deep pool of workers: Cubans. This is an amazing deal on every side.

• Guantanamo would benefit from millions of highly educated potential workers.

• It’s better for Cubans than sailing to Florida.

• Competitively, Cuba would experience a brain drain.

• Capitalism’s benefits would be evident, as infrastructure could be seen from Cuban soil.

• Cuba could follow suit by developing its own half of the Bay.

Making Guantanamo into a SEZ would be similar to what happened in Dubai, Hong Kong, Shenzhen, and Singapore: They were empty lands that became formidably rich because they had amazing portuary potential, obliterated regulatory obstacles, and sourced workers from nearby (China for Hong Kong and Singapore, South and South East Asia for Dubai).

Like Shenzhen and Hong Kong, another benefit would be to show the neighboring communist party that capitalism works better. China is not a communist country anymore, and I suspect the success of Shenzhen and Hong Kong played a big role in that transition.

Guantanamo Bay is small: With 117 km², it’s one-seventh the size of Singapore. Still, that’s 30 percent bigger than Hong Kong Island, and large enough for a big port, an airport, and housing for hundreds of thousands of people. Creating a SEZ there would also benefit the US by making shipping cheaper — and would be a dramatic boon for Puerto Rico, which can currently only source goods from US ships coming from the US.

Would it be legal?

The US has a perpetual lease on Guantanamo Bay per the 1903 Lease Agreement. The treaty establishes that the US can use it as a naval and coal station. The second part of the agreement, signed five months later in July 1903, goes further:

The United States of America agrees that no person, partnership, or corporation shall be permitted to establish or maintain a commercial, industrial or other enterprise within said areas.

Cuba would probably argue that a big city goes beyond the scope of a naval station, and that a Hong Kong-like city breaks the rules around establishing or maintaining enterprises. But the agreements are both short and broad, which leaves room for interpretation. For example, you can argue that a much bigger port would be valuable for the naval base, or that civilian use would make military provisioning much cheaper, or that the rest of the city is there to provide top services and recruits for the military to make it work more efficiently. You could technically establish and maintain enterprises elsewhere (Puerto Rico?) over the internet, while they simply operate in Guantanamo.

Working on the validity of the agreement might not even be useful: Cuba has been decrying the treaty for decades now, declaring it invalid and refusing to accept the US’s annual payments the treaty stipulates. What would Cuba do with a Guantanamo City? Disavow the treaty further? What would the US lose? Can Cuba be more uncooperative?

After pressure from the US, Panama scrapped its participation in China’s Belt and Road initiative. Isn’t the Guantanamo plan easier, since it doesn’t require any foreign power to take any action? And what’s harder: ethnically cleanse Gaza, take over Greenland, conquer Canada, or reinterpret one word on a piece of paper?

America can boldly reinterpret what’s possible. Imagine transforming Guantanamo Bay from a relic of the past into a dazzling epicenter of global trade and innovation — a Hong Kong or Singapore of the Caribbean, a shining example of what audacious vision can achieve, a beacon of hope, capitalism, and democracy for the hungry Cuban masses. If America wants to think big, this should be its first step.

— Tomas Pueyo