Cuban Missile Crisis

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President Kennedy in a crowded Cabinet Room during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

The Cuban Missile Crisis was the military confrontation, between the United States, the Soviet Union, and Cuba when the Cold War threatened to become a nuclear war. The Russians call it the "Caribbean Crisis," while the Cubans call it the "October Crisis." Like the Berlin Blockade it was one of the major confrontations of the Cold War.

The confrontation began on October 14, 1962, when U.S. reconnaissance photographs taken by an American U-2 spy plane revealed missile bases being built in Cuba, in response to similar U.S. bases built at the Turkish-Soviet border. After a bellicose confrontation on October 28, 1962, both U.S. President John F. Kennedy and Soviet General Secretary Nikita Khrushchev, with the United Nations Secretary-General's intercession, agreed to remove their respective nuclear missiles.

Cuban-American tensions

Soon after the Cuban Revolution the U.S. government became concerned about the political orientation of Fidel Castro`s government, and thus Cuba was a major focus of the new Kennedy administration when it assumed power in January 1961.[1] In Havana, there was fear of military intervention by the United States in Cuba. In April 1961, the threat of invasion became real when a force of CIA-trained Cuban exiles opposed to Castro landed at the Bay of Pigs. The invasion was quickly defeated by Cuba´s military forces. Castro was convinced the U.S. would invade Cuba.[2] Shortly after routing the Bay of Pigs invasion, he declared Cuba a socialist republic, established formal ties with the Soviet Union, and modernized Cuba's military. Moreover, President Kennedy's vacillation and pusillanimity, ending in Cuba's Bay of Pigs fiasco, had emboldened Nikita Khrushchev to go ahead with the construction of the Berlin Wall three months later and his even bolder, secret plan, to bring nuclear missiles to the doorsteps of the United States, 15 months later.[3]

The U.S. feared any country's adoption of communism or socialism, but for a Latin American country to openly ally with the USSR was regarded as unacceptable, given the Monroe Doctrine and the Russo-American enmity dating from WWII's end in 1945. Kennedy initiated Operation Mongoose, covert operations against Castro's government, which were to prove unsuccessful.[4] In 1962, the U.S. staged Operation Ortsac, the mock invasion of a Caribbean island, to depose its leader Ortsac ("Castro" spelled backwards).

President JFK meets with Gen. Curtis LeMay and the pilots who flew the reconnaissances of Cuba. Third from the left is Maj. Richard Heyser who first photographed the Cuban missiles bases.

In February 1962, the U.S. launched an economic embargo against Cuba[5]

Direct military attack was considered; Air Force Gen. Curtis Lemay presented to Kennedy a pre-invasion bombing plan in September, while spy flights and minor military harassment from the U.S. Guantánamo Naval Base were the subject of continual Cuban diplomatic complaints to the U.S. government.

U.S. nuclear advantage

The U.S. had the weapons advantage against the USSR until the Crisis. It is now known that in 1962 the U.S. had eight times as many rockets as the USSR: 27,297 to 3,332.[6] Before being arrested on the Crisis's first day, KGB Colonel Oleg Penkovsky was an Anglo-American spy. Historian Melman notes, "the proceedings of his trial in April 1963 revealed that he had delivered 5,000 frames of film of Soviet military-technical information, apart from many hours of talk with Western agents during several trips to western Europe"; the Soviets concluded "that the U.S. then possessed decisive advantage in arms and intelligence, and that the USSR no longer wielded a credible nuclear deterrent".[7]

Incapable of matching American bomber aeroplane production, the Russians had instead developed rockets.[8] After the Sputnik satellite was launched, the U.S. shifted from aeroplanes to rockets, previously a low-priority, to develop Intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).[8]

John von Neumann’s computer modeling rendered U.S. missiles and nuclear warheads light and economical.[8] The heavy (276-ton), bulky Soviet R-7 Semyorka ported a (3-ton), 3-megaton warhead 5,800 miles; the lighter, smaller (130-ton) U.S. Atlas ported a (1.5-ton) 3.8-megaton warhead 11,500 miles.[8] In October 1960, Soviet rocket scientists were killed in the Nedelin catastrophe; it delayed the Soviet R-16 ICBM program for a year. During the Caribbean Crisis, the USSR had only four R-7s and few R-16s deployed in vulnerable surface launchers, while the U.S. had 142 Atlas and 62 Titan I ICBMs, mostly in hardened underground silos.[8]

Moreover, in July 1960, the U.S. could launch 1,000-mile-range Polaris SLBMs from submerged submarines[8], while the Soviet submarine fleet had only some 100 technically-primitive, short range V-1-type cruise missiles launchable only from surfaced submarines.

The year before the Caribbean Crisis, Khrushchev had bluffed Kennedy with the 50-megaton Tsar Bomba program, the greatest nuclear explosion in history.[8] Taking advantage of the new Cuba-USSR alliance, Khrushchev was in a position to install nuclear missiles ranging to most major American cities.[8]

A silo-launched Jupiter IRBM of the USAF.

Few U.S. politico-military leaders thought several dozen nuclear missiles in Cuba could alter the strategic balance of military power: the USSR was outgunned. However, the proximity of a Cuban emplacement would reduce the warning of any launch to little or none.

In 1961, the U.S. deployed 15 Jupiter IRBMs (intermediate-range ballistic missiles) at İzmir, Turkey, aimed at the western USSR's cities, including Moscow. Given its 1,500-mile range, Moscow was only 16 minutes away. Yet, Kennedy gave them low strategic value, given that a SSBN submarine provided the same magnitude of threat, and from a distance.

Khrushchev publicly expressed anger and personal offence from the Turkish missile emplacement. The Cuban missile deployment — the first time Soviet missiles were outside the USSR — was his response to U.S. nuclear missiles in Turkey. Previously, Khrushchev had expressed doubt to the poet Robert Frost about the readiness of the "liberal" U.S. to fight over tough issues.[9]

Lead-up

It was in that politico-military atmosphere that Cuba and the USSR agreed to install nuclear missiles, with the understanding that a U.S. invasion would be repelled with nuclear weapons. Khrushchev sent them in May 1961, and by late July, more than sixty Soviet ships went to Cuba, some laden with military matériel.

In Paris, CIA Director John McCone (on honeymoon), was told by French Intelligence that the Soviets were installing missiles in Cuba. He warned Kennedy that some ships were missile-laden; however, the President — and his brother Robert, Secretary of State Dean Rusk, and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara — concluded that the Soviets would not do so. Kennedy's government had received repeated Soviet diplomatic disclaimers that there were no Cuban missiles, nor plans to install any, and that the USSR was uninterested in provoking an international confrontation that would affect the U.S. elections in November.

In late August, a spy flight photographed a new series of SAM sites being built, but on September 4 1962, Kennedy told Congress that there were no offensive missiles in Cuba. The same day U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy met Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin. In that meeting he stated American concern about nuclear missiles in Cuba. The ambassador assured him they were defensive and that the military build-up was insignificant. Days later, a spy flight photographed the building of a submarine pen disguised as a fishing village. On September 11, the Soviets publicly stated there was no need for installing nuclear weapons outside the USSR, including Cuba. That day, Khruschev personally communicated to Kennedy that there would be no offensive weapons emplaced in Cuba.[10]

U-2 flights and discovery

This U-2 reconnaissance photograph of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba. Shown are the transports and tents for fueling and maintenance.

The first consignment of SS-4 MRBMs arrived on the night of September 8, followed by a second on September 16. The Soviets were building nine sites — six for SS-4s and three for SS-5s with a 4,000 kilometre-range (2,400 statute miles). The planned arsenal was forty launchers, a 70% increase in first strike capacity. The Cuban populace readily noticed it, with over one thousand reports reaching Miami, which U.S. inteligence considered spurious.[11]

On October 8, Cuban President Dorticos spoke at the U.N. General Assembly: "If . . . we are attacked, we will defend ourselves. I repeat, we have sufficient means with which to defend ourselves; we have indeed our inevitable weapons, the weapons, which we would have preferred not to acquire, and which we do not wish to employ". Several unrelated problems meant the missiles were not discovered by the U.S. until an October 14 U-2 flight showed the construction of an SS-4 site at San Cristóbal, Pinar del Río Province, in western Cuba.

Planning a response

Kennedy saw the photographs on October 16[12]; he assembled the Executive Committee of the National Security Council (EXCOMM), fourteen key officials and his brother Robert, at 9.00 a.m. The U.S. had no plan for dealing with such a threat, because U.S. intelligence was convinced the Soviets would not install nuclear missiles in Cuba. The EXCOMM quickly discussed three courses of military action: (i) a destructive air attack on the missiles, (ii) a full military invasion, and (iii) the naval blockade of Cuba.[10]

Unanimously, the Joint Chiefs of Staff agreed that a full-scale attack and invasion was the only solution. They agreed that the Soviets would not act to stop the U.S. from conquering Cuba; Kennedy was skeptical, saying:

They, no more than we, can let these go by without doing something. They can't, after all their statements, permit us to take out their missiles, kill a lot of Russians, and then do nothing. If they don't take action in Cuba, they certainly will in Berlin.

Kennedy concluded that attacking by air would signal the Soviets to presume "a clear line" to conquer Berlin. Adding that in taking such an action, the United States' allies would think of the U.S. as "trigger-happy Americans" who lost Berlin, because they could not peacefully resolve the Cuban situation.

President Kennedy and SoD McNamara in an EXCOMM meeting.

Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara supported the naval blockade as a strong but limited military action that left the U.S. in control. Per international law a blockade is an act of war, but the Kennedy government felt themselves limited, thinking the USSR would not be provoked to attack by a mere blockade. Thus, for the appearance of legality, the euphemism quarantine was used instead of blockade. Given that the blockade occurred in "international waters", per Franklin D. Roosevelt's 1937 Quarantine Speech definition, Kennedy required approval of the Organization of American States as an internationally legal facade.

On October 18 Kennedy met Andrei Gromyko, who emphasised that there were no offensive weapons in Cuba and that the USSR's involvement was in land reform and defence. Yet by then, Kennedy knew that the Cuban missile arsenal represented about one half of the USSR's nuclear capability.[10] By October 19, continual U-2 spy flights showed four operational sites. The 1st Armored Division was sent to Georgia, and five army divisions were alerted for maximal action. The Strategic Air Command (SAC) distributed its aircraft to civilian airports and sent aloft its B-52 Stratofortress nuclear bombers, ready to attack.

Another EXCOMM war meeting showed that air attacks would kill 10,000 to 20,000 people. Another spy flight discovered bombers and cruise missiles on Cuba's north shore, and Kennedy authorized the blockade of Cuba.[13] When the press questioned him about Cuban offensive weapons, Kennedy told them to suppress their reports until after he addressed the nation; that evening he told the United Kingdom and other allies.

Quarantine

President Kennedy signs the Proclamation for Interdiction of the Delivery of Offensive Weapons to Cuba at the Oval Office on October 23 1962.

At 7 p.m. October 22, President Kennedy delivered a televised address announcing the discovery of the installations. He proclaimed that the United States would "...regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory response..." He also placed a naval "quarantine" on Cuba to prevent further Soviet shipments of military weapons from arriving there.

The following day all non-essential personnel were evacuated from Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, and the U.S. military was put on world-wide DEFCON 3 alert. Later that day the Organization of American States unanimously supported the decision to quarantine Cuba, and by the end of the day, 180 U.S. Navy ships were prepared for the blockade.

However, Khrushchev claimed that the blockade was illegal and ordered ships to bypass the quarantine. This became known to U.S. officials on the night of October 23 at a civil function in Washington, D.C. Lieutenant General Vladimir Dubovik made several comments that suggested that they would ignore the blockade, and when Ambassador Dobrynin arrived later he did not refute the account. A statement by Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union (TASS) claimed that U.S. ships would be attacked in response to any attack on Soviet shipping.[4]

The blockade went into effect at 10 a.m. on October 24. At the time, nineteen ships were en-route to Cuba from the Soviet Union. Sixteen of these were clearly identified as reversing course, and only the tanker Bucharest continued towards the U.S. lines. The other two, the Gagarin and Komiles were later discovered only a few miles from the U.S. lines, and they were being escorted by a Soviet submarine positioned between the two ships. The USS Essex group was instructed to block the progress of the submarine and was authorized to use "small explosives" if necessary. At 10:25 a.m. John McCone received an intelligence message and announced that the ships had gone dead in the water. Dean Rusk leaned over to McGeorge Bundy and noted "We're eyeball to eyeball, and I think the other fellow just blinked."[4]

Crisis deepens

Only an hour later, at 11:24 a.m. a cable drafted by George Ball to the U.S. Ambassador in Turkey and the U.S. Ambassador to NATO notified them that they were considering making an offer to withdraw missiles from Turkey in exchange for a withdrawal from Cuba. Later, on the morning of October 25, journalist Walter Lippman proposed the same thing in his syndicated column. For many years this has been interpreted as a trial balloon floated by the Kennedy administration, although the historical record suggests this is not the case.

At the time the crisis continued unabated, and that evening TASS reported on an exchange of telegrams between Khrushchev and Bertrand Russell, where Khrushchev warned that the United States' "pirate action" would lead to war. However this was followed at 9:24 p.m. by a telegram from Khrushchev to Kennedy which was received at 10:52 p.m., in which Khrushchev stated that "if you coolly weight the situation which has developed, not giving way to passions, you will understand that the Soviet Union cannot fail to reject the arbitrary demands of the United States", and that the Soviet Union views the blockade as "an act of aggression" and their ships will be instructed to ignore it.

That night, the Joint Chiefs of Staff instructed Strategic Air Command to go to DEFCON 2, for the only time in history. The message, and the response, were deliberately transmitted uncoded, in order to allow Soviet intelligence to capture them.[4] Operation Falling Leaves quickly set up three radar bases to watch for missile launches from Cuba. The radars were experimental models ahead of their time. Each base was connected with a hotline to NORAD control.

At 1:45 a.m. on October 25, Kennedy responded to Khrushchev's telegram, stating that the U.S. was forced into action after receiving repeated assurances that no offensive missiles were being placed in Cuba, and that when these assurances proved to be false, the deployment "required the responses I have announced... I hope that your government will take necessary action to permit a restoration of the earlier situation."

The image is a recently declassified map used by the U.S. Navy's Atlantic Fleet shows the position of American and Soviet ships at the height of the crisis.

At 7:15 a.m., the USS Essex and USS Gearing attempted to intercept the Bucharest but failed to do so. Fairly certain the tanker did not contain any military materiel, it was allowed through the blockade. Later that day, at 5:43 p.m., the commander of the blockade effort ordered the USS Kennedy to intercept and board the Lebanese freighter Marcula. This took place the next day, and the Marucla was cleared through the blockade after its cargo was checked.

At 5:00 p.m. Dean Rusk announced that the missiles in Cuba were still actively being worked on. This report was later verified by a CIA report that suggested there had been no slow-down at all. In response, Kennedy issued Security Action Memorandum 199, authorizing the loading of nuclear weapons onto aircraft under the command of SACEUR (which had the duty of carrying out the first air strikes on the Soviet Union).

The next morning, Kennedy informed the executive committee that he believed only an invasion will remove the missiles from Cuba. However he was persuaded to give the matter time and continue with both military and diplomatic pressure. He agreed and ordered the low-level flights over the island to be increased from two per day to once every two hours. He also ordered a crash program to institute a new civil government in Cuba if an invasion went ahead.

At this point the crisis was ostensibly at a stalemate. The USSR had shown no indication that they would back down and had made several comments to the contrary. The U.S. had no reason to believe otherwise and was in the early stages of preparing for an invasion, along with a nuclear strike on the Soviet Union in the case they responded militarily, which was assumed.

Secret negotiations

At 1:00 p.m., John Scali of ABC News had lunch with Aleksandr Fomin at Fomin's request. He noted that "war seems about to break out" and asked Scali to use his contacts to talk to his "high-level friends" at the State Department to see if the U.S. would be interested in a diplomatic solution. He suggested that the language of the deal would contain an assurance from the Soviet Union to remove the weapons under UN supervision and that Castro would publicly announce not to accept such weapons in the future, in exchange for a public statement by the U.S. that they would never invade Cuba. The U.S. responded by asking the Brazilian government to pass a message to Castro that the U.S. would be "unlikely to invade" if the missiles are removed.

At 6:00 p.m. the State Department started receiving a message that appeared to be written personally by Khrushchev. Robert Kennedy described the letter as "very long and emotional". Khrushchev re-iterated the basic outline that had been stated to Scali earlier in the day, "I propose: we, for our part, will declare that our ships bound for Cuba are not carrying any armaments. You will declare that the United States will not invade Cuba with its troops and will not support any other forces which might intend to invade Cuba. Then the necessity of the presence of our military specialists in Cuba will disappear." At 6:45, news of Fomin's offer to Scali was finally heard and was interpreted as a "set up" for the arrival of Khrushchev's letter. The letter was then considered official and accurate, although it was later learned that Fomin was almost certainly operating of his own accord without official backing. Additional study of the letter was ordered and continued into the night.

Crisis continues

Castro, on the other hand, was convinced an invasion was soon at hand, and he dictated a letter to Khrushchev that appeared to call for a preemptive strike on the U.S. He also ordered all anti-aircraft weapons in Cuba to fire on any U.S. aircraft, whereas in the past they were ordered only to fire on groups of two or more. At 6:00 a.m. on October 27, the CIA delivered a memo reporting that three of the four missile sites at San Cristobal and the two sites at Sagua la Grande appeared to be fully operational. They also note that the Cuban military continued to organize for action, although they were under order not to initiate action unless attacked.

At 9 a.m. Radio Moscow began broadcasting a message from Khrushchev. Contrary to the letter of the night before, the message offered a new trade, that the missiles on Cuba would be removed in exchange for the removal of the Jupiters from Turkey. Throughout the crisis, Turkey had repeatedly stated they would be upset if the Jupiter missiles were removed. At 10 a.m. the executive committee met again to discuss the situation. McNamara noted that another tanker, the Grozny, was about 600 miles out and should be intercepted. He also noted that they had not made the USSR aware of the quarantine line and suggested relaying this information to them via U Thant at the UN.

An Air Force U-2 "Dragon Lady" similar to this one was shot down over Cuba.

While the meeting progressed, at 11:03 a.m. a new message began to arrive from Khrushchev. The message stated, in part, "You are disturbed over Cuba. You say that this disturbs you because it is ninety miles by sea from the coast of the United States of America. But... you have placed destructive missile weapons, which you call offensive, in Turkey, literally next to us... I therefore make this proposal: We are willing to remove from Cuba the means which you regard as offensive... Your representatives will make a declaration to the effect that the United States ... will remove its analogous means from Turkey... and after that, persons entrusted by the United Nations Security Council could inspect on the spot the fulfillment of the pledges made." The executive committee continued to meet through the day.

Around noon that day a Lockheed U-2 piloted by Rudolph Anderson was shot down by a SA-2 Guideline SAM emplacement in Cuba, increasing the stress in negotiations between the USSR and the U.S. It was later learned that the decision to fire was made locally by a Soviet commander on his own authority, although exactly who this was is a matter of some debate. Later that day, at about 3:41 p.m., several F8U Crusader aircraft on low-level recon missions were fired upon, and one was hit by a 37 mm shell but managed to return to base.

At 4 p.m. Kennedy recalled the executive committee to the White House and ordered that a message immediately be sent to U Thant asking if the Soviets would "suspend" work on the missiles while negotiations are carried out. During this meeting, Maxwell Taylor delivered the news that the U-2 had been shot down. Kennedy had earlier claimed he would order an attack on such sites if fired upon, but he decided to leave the matter unless another attack was made.

Drafting the response

Throughout the meeting, Kennedy suggested they take up Khrushchev's offer to trade away the missiles. Unknown to most members of the EXCOMM, Robert Kennedy had been meeting with the USSR Ambassador in Washington to feel out if their intentions were genuine. The EXCOMM was generally against the proposal because it would undermine NATO, and the Turkish government had repeatedly stated they were against any such trade. If Kennedy could be forced to give up nuclear weapons in Turkey through actions in another part of the world, no European nation could consider itself safe from having their safety similarly bargained away.

As the meeting progressed, a new plan emerged and Kennedy was slowly won over. The new plan called for the President to ignore the latest message and return to Khrushchev's earlier one. Kennedy was initially hesitant, feeling that Khrushchev would no longer accept the deal because a new one had been offered, but Llewellyn Thompson argued that he might accept it anyway. Theodore Sorensen and Robert Kennedy left the meeting and returned 45 minutes later with a draft letter to this effect. The President made several changes, had it typed, and sent it.

After the EXCOMM meeting, a smaller meeting continued in the Oval Office. The group argued that the letter should be underscored with an oral message to Ambassador Dobrynin stating that if the missiles were not withdrawn, military action would be used to remove them. Dean Rusk added one proviso, that no part of the language of the deal would mention Turkey, but there would be an understanding that the missiles would be removed "voluntarily" in the immediate aftermath. The President agreed, and the message was sent.

An EXCOMM meeting during the Cuban Missile Crisis. President Kennedy, Secretary of State Rusk, and Secretary of Defense McNamara, in the White House Cabinet Room.

At Dean Rusk's request, Fomin and Scali met again. Scali asked why the two letters from Khrushchev were so different, and Fomin claimed it was because of "poor communications". Scali replied that the claim was not credible and shouted that he thought it was a "stinking double cross". He went on to claim that an invasion was only hours away, at which point Fomin stated that a response to the U.S. message was expected from Khrushchev shortly, and he urged Scali to tell the State Department no treachery was intended. Scali said that he did not think anyone would believe him, but he agreed to deliver the message. The two went their separate ways, and Scali immediately typed out a memo for the EXCOMM.

Within the U.S. establishment it was well understood that ignoring the second offer and returning to the first put Khrushchev in a terrible position. Military preparations continued, and all active duty Air Force personnel were recalled to base for possible action. Robert Kennedy later recalled the mood, "We had not abandoned all hope, but what hope there was now rested with Khrushchev's revising his course within the next few hours. It was a hope, not an expectation. The expectation was military confrontation by Tuesday, and possibly tomorrow..."

At 8:05 p.m. the letter drafted earlier in the day was delivered. The message read, "As I read your letter, the key elements of your proposals—which seem generally acceptable as I understand them—are as follows: 1) You would agree to remove these weapons systems from Cuba under appropriate United Nations observation and supervision; and undertake, with suitable safe-guards, to halt the further introduction of such weapon systems into Cuba. 2) We, on our part, would agree—upon the establishment of adequate arrangements through the United Nations, to ensure the carrying out and continuation of these commitments (a) to remove promptly the quarantine measures now in effect and (b) to give assurances against the invasion of Cuba." The letter was also released directly to the press to ensure it could not be "delayed."

With the letter delivered a deal was on the table. However, as Robert Kennedy noted, there was little expectation it would be accepted. At 9 p.m. the EXCOMM met again to review the actions for the following day. Plans were drawn up for airstrikes on the missile sites as well as other economic targets, notably petroleum storage. McNamara stated that they had to "have two things ready: a government for Cuba, because we're going to need one, and secondly, plans for how to respond to the Soviet Union in Europe, because sure as hell they're going to do something there".

At 12:12 a.m.on October 28, the U.S. informed its NATO allies that "the situation is growing shorter... the United States may find it necessary within a very short time in its interest and that of its fellow nations in the Western Hemisphere to take whatever military action may be necessary." To add to the concern, at 6 a.m. the CIA reported that all missiles in Cuba were ready for action.

Ending of crisis

After much deliberation between the Soviet Union and Kennedy's cabinet, Kennedy agreed to remove all missiles set in place on the border of the Soviet Union in exchange for Khrushchev removing all missiles in Cuba.

At 9 a.m. on October 28, a new message from Khrushchev was broadcast on Radio Moscow. Khrushchev stated "the Soviet government, in addition to previously issued instructions on the cessation of further work at the building sites for the weapons, has issued a new order on the dismantling of the weapons which you describe as 'offensive' and their crating and return to the Soviet Union."

Kennedy immediately responded, issuing a statement calling the letter "an important and constructive contribution to peace". He continued this with a formal letter: "I consider my letter to you of October twenty-seventh and your reply of today as firm undertakings on the part of both our governments which should be promptly carried out... The U.S. will make a statement in the framework of the Security Council in reference to Cuba as follows: It will declare that the United States of America will respect the inviolability of Cuban borders, its sovereignty, that it take the pledge not to interfere in internal affairs, not to intrude themselves and not to permit our territory to be used as a bridgehead for the invasion of Cuba, and will restrain those who would plan to carry an aggression against Cuba, either from U.S. territory or from the territory of other countries neighboring to Cuba."[14]

The practical effect of this Kennedy-Khrushchev Pact was that it effectively strengthened Castro's position in Cuba in that he would not be invaded by the United States. Communism would survive in the Caribbean Island. It is possible that Khrushchev only placed the missiles in Cuba to get Kennedy to remove the missiles from Turkey and that the Soviets had no intention of resorting to nuclear war when they were out-gunned by the Americans. However because the withdrawals from Turkey were not made public at the time, Khrushchev was seemed as losing the conflict and weakened. The perception was that Kennedy had won the contest between the superpowers and Khrushchev had been humiliated. However this is not entirely the case as both Kennedy and Khrushchev took every step to avoid full out conflict despite the pressures of people in their governments. Khrushchev would hold on to power for another two years.[15]

Aftermath

President Kennedy with advisors after EXCOMM meeting on 29 October 1962 after the Cuban Missile Crisis officially ended.

The compromise was a particularly sharp embarrassment for Khrushchev and the Soviet Union because the withdrawal of U.S. missiles from Turkey was not made public—it was a secret deal between Kennedy and Khrushchev. The Russians were seen as retreating from circumstances that they had started — though if played well, it could have looked like just the opposite. Khrushchev's fall from power two years later can be partially linked to Politburo embarrassment at both Khrushchev's eventual concessions to the U.S. and his ineptitude in precipitating the crisis in the first place. However, the Cuban Missile Crisis was not solely responsible for the fall of Khrushchev. The main reason was that rival politicians such as Leonid Brezhnev believed that Khrushchev did not have enough "power" to handle international crises[citation needed].


For Cuba, it was a partial betrayal by the Soviets, given that decisions on how to resolve the crisis had been made exclusively by Kennedy and Khrushchev, and certain issues of interest to Cuba, such as the status of Guantanamo, were not addressed. On the other hand, Cuba continued to be protected from invasion.

U.S. military commanders were not happy with the result either. General LeMay told the President that it was "the greatest defeat in our history" and that the U.S. should invade immediately. There has been speculation that there was some connection between Kennedy´s policies towards Cuba and his death, but there are other Kennedy assassination theories.

The Cuban Missile Crisis spurred the creation of the "red telephone," a direct communications link between Moscow and Washington D.C. The purpose of this undersea line was to have a way the leaders of the two Cold War countries could communicate directly to better solve a crisis like the one in October 1962.

Various commentators (Melman, 1988; Hersh, 1997) also suggest that the Cuban Missile Crisis enhanced the hubris of the United States military planners, leading to military adventurism, most decidedly in the Vietnam War.

This Russo-American confrontation was synchronous with the Sino-Indian War, dating from the U.S.'s military quarantine of Cuba; historians speculate that the Chinese attack against India, for disputed land, was meant to coincide with the Cuban Missile Crisis.[16]

This incident also had an implication for the Bahamas, whose economy was near collapse at the time. After the crisis, U.S. tourists were prohibited from visiting Cuba. Hence the Bahamas became a sought after tourist destination, and its economy was once again stabilized.

Historical notes

Adlai Stevenson shows aerial photos of Cuban missiles to the United Nations in November 1962.

Arthur Schlesinger, historian and adviser to John F. Kennedy, on National Public Radio on October 16, 2002, revealed that Castro had not wanted the missiles but that Khrushchev had forced them upon Cuba in a bit of political arm-twisting and "socialist solidarity." Schlesinger believed that, having accepted the missiles, Castro was angrier with Khrushchev than he was at Kennedy when the missiles were withdrawn, because Khrushchev had not consulted Castro prior to deciding to remove them from Cuba.[citation needed]

In early 1992 it was confirmed that key Soviet forces in Cuba had, by the time the crisis broke, received tactical nuclear warheads for their artillery rockets and IL-28 bombers [2], though General Anatoly Gribkov, part of the Soviet staff responsible for the operation, stated that the local Soviet commander, General Issa Pliyev, had predelegated authority to use them if the U.S. had mounted a full-scale invasion of Cuba. Gribkov misspoke: the Kremlin's authorization remained unsigned and undelivered.[3] (Other accounts show that Pliyev was given permission to use tactical nuclear warheads but only in the most extreme case of an U.S. invasion during which contact with Moscow is lost. However when U.S. forces seemed to be readying for an attack (after the U-2 photos, but before Kennedy's television address), Khrushchev rescinded his earlier permission for Pliyev to use the tactical nuclear weapons, even under the most extreme conditions.)

See also

Notes

  1. ^ A Thousand days:John F Kennedy in the White House Arthur Schlesinger Jr 1965
  2. ^ Cuban Missile Crisis Causes
  3. ^ Faria, Miguel A. Cuba in Revolution-- Escape from a Lost Paradise (2002) Hacienda Publishing, Macon, Ga., pp.102-105. ISBN: 0-9641077-3-2
  4. ^ a b c d The Cuban Missile Crisis - An In-Depth Chronology
  5. ^ Proclamation 3447--Embargo on all trade with Cuba The American Presidency Project
  6. ^ "Archive of Nuclear Data". National Resources Defense Council. Retrieved 2006-08-04.
  7. ^ Melman, 1988, p.119
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h Executive Producer: Philip Nugus (2006). Weapons Races: Nuclear Bomb (television). Military Channel & Nugus/Martin Productions LTD.
  9. ^ The Presidential Recordings of John F. Kennedy, Sept 10 1962, p111
  10. ^ a b c The Cuban Missile Crisis, BBC
  11. ^ [1]
  12. ^ Revelations from the Russian Archives
  13. ^ The Cuban Missile Crisis, October 18-29, 1962, audio recordings
  14. ^ Faria, Cuba in Revolution, p.103
  15. ^ Faria, Cuba in Revolution, pp.102-105.
  16. ^ Frontier India India-China Section Note alleged connections to Cuban Missile Crisis

References

The short time span of the Cuban Missile Crisis and the extensive documentation of the decision-making processes on both sides makes it an excellent case study for analysis of state decision-making. In the Essence of Decision, Graham T. Allison and Philip D. Zelikow use the crisis to illustrate multiple approaches to analyzing the actions of the state.

It was also a substantial part of the 2003 documentary The Fog of War, which won an Oscar.


  • Allison, Graham and Zelikow, P. Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis; New York: Longman, 1999.
  • Blight, James G., and David A. Welch. On the Brink: Americans and Soviets Reexamine the Cuban Missile Crisis; New York: Hill and Wang, 1989.
  • Brugioni, Dino A. Eyeball to Eyeball: The Inside Story of the Cuban Missile Crisis; New York: Random House, 1991.
  • Chayes, Abram. The Cuban Missile Crisis, International Crisis and the Role of Law; Oxford University Press, 1974; 2nd ed., 1987.
  • Diez Acosta, Tomás, October 1962: The 'Missile' Crisis As Seen From Cuba; Pathfinder Press, New York, 2002.
  • Divine, Robert A. The Cuban Missile Crisis; New York: M. Wiener Pub.,1988.
  • Faria, Miguel, Cuba in Revolution--Escape from a Lost Paradise(2002); Hacienda Publishing, Macon, Georgia, ISBN: 0-9641077-3-2. http://www.haciendapub.com
  • Frankel, Max, High Noon in the Cold War; Ballantine Books, 2004; Presidio Press (reprint), 2005; ISBN 0-345-46671-3.
  • Fursenko, Aleksandr, and Naftali, Timothy; One Hell of a Gamble - Khrushchev, Castro and Kennedy 1958-1964; W.W. Norton (New York 1998)
  • Fursenko, Aleksandr; Night Session of the Presidium of the Central Committee, 22-23 October; Naval War College Review, vol. 59, no. 3 (Summer 2006).
  • George, Alice L. (2006). Awaiting Armageddon: How Americans Faced the Cuban Missile Crisis. University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 0807828289.
  • Gonzalez, Servando The Nuclear Deception: Nikita Khrushchev and the Cuban Missile Crisis; IntelliBooks, 2002; ISBN 0-9711391-5-6.
  • Kennedy, Robert F. Thirteen Days: A Memoir of the Cuban Missile Crisis; ISBN 0-393-31834-6.
  • Khrushchev, Sergei, How my father and President Kennedy saved the world; American Heritage magazine, October 2002 issue.
  • May, Ernest R. (editor); Zelikow, Philip D. (editor), The Kennedy Tapes : Inside the White House during the Cuban Missile Crisis; Belknap Press, 1997; ISBN 0-674-17926-9.
  • Polmar, Norman and Gresham, John D. (foreword by Clancy, Tom) DEFCON – 2: Standing on the Brink of Nuclear War During the Cuban Missile Crisis; Wiley, 2006; ISBN 0-471-67022-7.
  • Pope, Ronald R., Soviet Views on the Cuban Missile Crisis: Myth and Reality in Foreign Policy Analysis; University Press of America, 1982.
  • Stern, Sheldon M., Averting the Final Failure: John F. Kennedy and the Secret Cuban Missile Crisis Meetings; Stanford University Press, 2003; ISBN 0804748462
  • Stern, Sheldon M. (2005). The Week The World Stood Still: Inside The Secret Cuban Missile Crisis (Stanford Nuclear Age Series). Stanford University Press. ISBN 0804750777.
  • The Cuban Missile Crisis: Declassified (Television Program)

Further reading

The intensity and magnitude of the crisis provide excellent material for drama, as illustrated by the movies The Missiles of October (1974), a television docudrama directed by Anthony Page and starring William Devane, Ralph Bellamy, Howard Da Silva and Martin Sheen, and Thirteen Days (2000), directed by Roger Donaldson and starring Kevin Costner, Bruce Greenwood and Steven Culp.

External links

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