Vladimir Putin’s Russia, eager to return to superpower status, is increasingly trying to play out its conflict with the United Sates in Latin America while “profiting from weapons sales and challenging and provoking the USA,” Costa Rican social scientist Constantino Urcuyo told a U.S. congressional committee in Washington, D.C. last Thursday.

Russia is courting Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua "to gain access to air bases and ports for resupply of Russian naval assets and strategic bombers operating in the Western Hemisphere."