Q&A ยท 2:57:00-2:59:33

Was Guantanamo Bay part of the destroyers-for-bases agreement?

A live chronology check separates Guantanamo Bay's British wartime episode from the later origins of the United States naval base.

Question

Was Guantanamo Bay one of the British bases transferred to the United States under the destroyers-for-bases agreement?

Short answer

No. The temporary British occupation during the War of Jenkins' Ear was separate from the American base established after the Spanish-American War and the 1898 Treaty of Paris.

Notes

A viewer suggests that Guantanamo Bay came to the United States through the destroyers-for-bases agreement. The answer pauses to check the chronology and rejects that identification. Britain temporarily controlled the bay during the War of Jenkins' Ear before Spanish forces expelled it, while the later American presence followed the Spanish-American War and Spain's relinquishment of Cuba in the Treaty of Paris of 1898. The continuing United States base is dated from 1901, separating two distinct episodes in Atlantic naval-base history.