It is strict enough to leave very little room for the Administration to apply other policy instruments for the short term. In early February 1996, several U.S. policy makers involved in Cuban affairs had left their jobs, including Alexander Watson, Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs. The incident was the pretext to let the political trend of reinforced hostility prevail. The essential conflict is sovereignty versus domination. Paradoxically, U.S. allies reactions to the extraterritorial character of the Helms-Burton Act create favorable conditions for returning Cuba to the U.S. foreign policy agenda instead of relegating it to the domestic agenda.
Trade is a top priority in the U.S. foreign policy agenda.
There is a pressing lack of consensus in Congress, even among Republicans, on whether international trade should be an instrument of foreign policy. After the January 5,1999 measures were announced by President Clinton, a fresh debate about the President's licensing powers arose. Almost immediately, the three Cuban American representatives said that they would sue to prevent the President from implementing these changes because they violated the Helms-Burton law. In Congress, with the rightist conservative movement in major committees and subcommittees, discussion of the Cuban issue has leaned toward enforcing strong measures against the island. In both the Executive and the Congress, a perception prevails that Cuba cannot continue to make its process viable and that, in the short run, changes made on the island will be more in line with foreign policy aims.