Last month’s Seventh Summit of the Americas has come and gone but the next year will show whether it was a turning point in hemispheric relations, or the only sign of a thaw was just prematurely warm spring weather. The international media highlighted the historic meeting between the presidents of the United States and Cuba. This was convenient for the White House, which wanted to avoid the impression of yet another disastrous summit by showing progress on an initiative that will be President Barack Obama’s only positive achievement in this hemisphere — assuming U.S.-Cuban relations are finally normalized.

But for those who followed the details of the summit, it also very clearly marked a strategic retreat for Washington. On March 9, just a few weeks before the meeting, the White House implemented economic sanctions against Venezuela. This provoked a strong and nearly unanimous objection from Latin America, including both the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), which includes all countries in the region except the United States and Canada. These organizations took the extraordinary step of demanding that President Obama rescind the executive order that implemented the sanctions.

The White House could have ignored its isolation in the hemisphere, as it has for years in many other instances, but for Cuba. Normalizing relations with Havana is something that President Obama is seeking for his legacy. The Cuban government made it clear that it was not going to be party to a process where the United States replaced its long war against Havana with another Latin American target that had never done anything to harm the United States. Fidel Castro announced his support for Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro “in the face of the brutal plans by the United States government.” His brother and current Cuban President Raúl Castro also joined numerous Latin American leaders in denouncing the sanctions.

Actions followed words: The U.S. delegation negotiating the normalization of relations with Cuba went to Havana on March 16 and was expected to stay until midweek, but went home the same day.

The White House realized it had made a big mistake in imposing these sanctions, and put out statements intended to walk back the blunder. “We do not believe that Venezuela poses a threat to the United States, nor does the United States threaten the Venezuelan government,” Obama said. And then he did something that no U.S. president has done since 1999, when Hugo Chávez was president-elect of Venezuela: he met with Venezuela’s head of state. This was arguably as important for hemispheric relations as his meeting with Raúl Castro. While the Obama administration has recognized the folly of Washington’s decades-long effort to get rid of the Cuban government, it has yet to reach the same conclusion about Venezuela.