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Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Rafael Martie/U.S. Navy
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A U.S. Navy fast-attack submarine arrived in Cuba's Guantanamo Bay on Thursday, hard on the heels of a Russian flotilla's arrival in Havana 24 hours earlier.
The USS Helena, one of around two dozen Los Angeles-class nuclear-powered, conventionally armed boats, was making "a routine port visit...while conducting its global maritime security and national defense mission," the U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) said in a statement on social media.
On Wednesday, Cuban armed forces welcomed the Russian Northern Fleet missile frigate Admiral Gorshkov with a 21-cannon salute as the fleet flagship led the Yasen-M-class cruise missile submarine Kazan into Havana Bay for a stopover from June 12-17.
"None of the vessels carries nuclear weapons," Cuba's Foreign Ministry said earlier this week.
The visit, roughly 100 miles south of the Florida Keys, "does not represent any threat to the region," the Cuban government said.