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Letter to the editor

For 2 weeks, fear of nuclear war

Q&A   |   Cuban missile crisis

By Times Wires
Published October 15, 2007

Early on Tuesday, Oct. 16, 1962, President John F. Kennedy's national security assistant, McGeorge Bundy, brought to the president's bedroom some high-altitude photographs taken from U-2 spy planes flying over Cuba on Oct. 14. They showed Soviet soldiers hurriedly and secretly setting up nuclear-armed missiles - 90 miles from Florida. The 45th anniversary of the beginning of the Cuban missile crisis is this week.

Why were the missiles there?

The Soviets had been sending defensive weaponry to Cuba, including antiaircraft missiles. But they secretly supplied missile installations that could be used offensively, after Cuban leaders became convinced the United States was planning to attack the island. Once the presence of a ballistic missile was confirmed, Kennedy demanded their removal and dismantling of the bases. Then things got interesting.

How so?

On Oct. 22, Kennedy ordered a naval quarantine (blockade) of Cuba to stop further shipments and declared that any missile launched from Cuba would warrant a full-scale retaliatory attack against the Soviet Union. U.S. ships were deployed in an arc 500 miles from the eastern tip of Cuba. The Soviets said they intended to ignore the "illegal" blockade.

Who blinked?

On Oct. 24, most of the Russian ships altered course. Several continued, escorted by a nuclear submarine. After sharp exchanges, the Soviet Union agreed to withdraw its missiles in return for a U.S. pledge that it would not invade Cuba. However, to complete the deal, Kennedy and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev also made a private agreement to remove U.S. missiles from Turkey, which shared borders with the Soviet Union. On Oct. 28, the two leaders completed the agreement and the crisis ended as suddenly as it had begun.

Why was this standoff so important?

The crisis was one of the most serious incidents of the Cold War, a period of intense U.S.-Soviet rivalry that began after World War II ended. With armed forces on both sides at their highest state of readiness, most experts believe that for 14 days the fate of millions of people rested upon the ability of Kennedy and Khrushchev to reach a compromise and avoid nuclear war.

It was also a key Cold War turning point. The agreement between Kennedy and Khrushchev was kept secret because many, both in Europe and the United States, would have opposed it. Almost all Americans thus thought that Kennedy had forced the Soviet Union to remove the missiles simply by threatening war.

Some experts believe that, as a result, U.S. foreign policy used greater toughness and more threats of force after the crisis. Some think this led to U.S. military opposition to communist forces in the Vietnam War. It also led to a direct communications link between Moscow and Washington, the so-called red phone.

For Fidel Castro, although the Russians shut him out of negotiations, Cuba continued to be protected from invasion.

Compiled from Times wires. Information from World Book Online; "The Cold War's Last Front: the United States and Cuba," by Nathan A. Haverstock; and BBC Online was used in this report.

[Last modified October 14, 2007, 22:42:20]