Cuban Missile Crisis

Cuba's location

The Cuban Missile Crisis was a period of tension between the Soviet Union and the United States, using Cuba as a battleground. It happened when the Soviet Union began building missile sites in Cuba in 1962.

In 1959, the new revolutionary government of Cuba confiscated (took over) some American businesses which were producing goods (things to sell) there. America refused to buy anything from Cuba after that. The U. S. embargo against Cuba began February 7, 1962. In 1962, America was worried that the USSR would attack America through Cuba, since Cuba is near enough to the United States that the missiles could reach any important American city.

In October 1962, America blocked Soviet ships carrying missiles from going into Cuba. The Soviets and Cubans agreed to remove the missiles if America promised not to invade Cuba. America later removed some missiles from the country of Turkey, near the Soviet Union. But whether anyone "won" isn't really known, and the USSR lost China's support over it.

Causes of the Cuban Missile Crisis

Fidel Castro

Fidel Castro

In Cuba, Fidel Castro took power from General Batista on January 1, 1959. From 1952 to 1959, Batista was a military dictator in Cuba, very right-wing with Communist and Mafia connections and the support of the Eisenhower Administration. The United States was interested in Cuba because of the many businesses that they had there, even though the country was a dictatorship. The countries were also military friends. This was shown by the US base at Guantánamo Bay. When Castro came to power in Cuba, he nationalised American companies in Cuba, meaning he took the private property from those companies and made it the property of Cuba, to use as Castro decided. The United States decided to break off economic relations with Cuba (which means that they would stop buying things from them). They stopped all aid going to Cuba and stopped buying Cuban sugar (which was Cuba's main export). This was a disaster for Castro, because America bought the most Cuban sugar. However, Russia saved the Cuban economy by buying Cuban sugar for a lot of money.

The Solution

Castro turned to the USSR, still powerful at that time. He signed a contract with Nikita Khrushchev, the Russian president at the time. The contract said that the USSR would buy 1 million tonnes of Cuban sugar once a year, every year in exchange for Castro's Communist support; he declared himself a Marxist-Leninist, December 2, 1961.

The reasons that Krushchev wanted to help Cuba were the following:

• He wanted a Communist state close to United States.
• He wanted to test the new president John F. Kennedy.
• He wanted a chance to get the American missile sites off of Turkey, which was close to Russia.

The Bay of Pigs

The Eisenhower Administration was worried that Castro was a Communist. This was a threat to American security. A timeline (chronology) released by the National Security Archives shows the U. S. began planning to overthrow the government of Cuba in October, 1959. After the nationalization of American property on the island, Eisenhower broke diplomatic relations with the revolutionary government of Cuba on January 3, 1961 and plans were made to topple (to remove from a position of authority) the Castro regime. The Kennedy Administration inherited those plans. On April 17, 1961, the CIA launched (initiated) an operation later called the Bay of Pigs Invasion by Brigade 2506. The goal was for a group of Cubans including some who were still loyal to General Batista to attack Cuba and overthrow Castro; presumably (it was taken for granted or assumed), the American armed forces would back up the invasion but President Kennedy refused to give the order.

As the troops set off to attack Cuba, Kennedy grew nervous. The president suffered from a rare endocrine disorder of chronic adrenal insufficiency called Addison's disease for which he received steroid and cortisone treatment. Stress calls on the adrenal glands to function. One of the clinical symptoms of an Addisonian (adrenal) crisis is confusion and psychosis. There was substantial secrecy surrounding his health during his years as president and the 25th amendment to the U. S. Constitution was introduced at least in part as a result of this secrecy. He thought that an American backed operation against a Communist state would lead to a full scale war against Krushchev. Kennedy decided not to provide American air support at the last moment. This led to the Bay of Pigs being a complete failure. Kennedy was humiliated in the United States and also the USSR.

The results of the Bay of Pigs

Castro wanted to feel safe from the United States. He knew that if a second Bay of Pigs happened, that Cuba might lose and he would be removed from power. He asked Krushchev for missile sites to be built on Cuba so that he could defend himself against any American threat. The USSR agreed to this and started building missile sites on Cuba. These missiles could hit every major city in the United States.
When Kennedy found out about the missile sites on October 16 by sending a United States Navy F-8 Crusader to take pictures of Cuba, he saw the missile sites and immediately came to the worst conclusion: that Cuba was preparing to attack the USA.

Kennedy's Options

The United States was outraged when they found out about the missile sites. Kennedy's advisers did not believe that the missiles were completely ready at the time they first saw the pictures, but they guessed that the missiles would be ready in less than 2 weeks (this is where the movie and book, 13 Days, get their name). This meant that Kennedy had to act fast. His options were not clear at first, so he started EXCOMM (Executive Committee of the National Security Council) so they would give him some options. The options basically were:

Options	Good-side	Bad-side
Do nothing	Avoids a war	Kennedy would look weak to the USSR and the rest of the world. Leaves active nuclear missiles very close to the USA.
Attack	Would destroy SOME missile sites.	Lots of soldiers would die and Cuba could launch nuclear missiles at the US and cause a lot of destruction, including possibly the destruction of Earth.
Diplomatic pressure	Would avoid a war and maybe convince USSR to remove the missiles	USSR would probably not give up and it could end up making them look like they held more power than the US or its allies.
Build a Blockade	No casualties. Would make it hard for Cuba to get food, military and other support from USSR or others and would stop any more missiles from coming to Cuba	The missile sites that were already in Cuba would still be there. It was also internationally illegal to run a blockade and could be seen as an act of war against the USSR, causing a war.

Kennedy chose to build a blockade around Cuba to stop all ships going there. The blockade was put in place on October 20.

Krushchev's Options / The Krushchev Letters

The USSR's first ships arrived at the blockade on October 25 and were turned away.

Krushchev sent a letter to Kennedy on October 26. Kennedy's advisers said that the letter looked like it had been written by Krushchev himself and not his official writers who would normally do it. They also said that it looked like it was written by a man who was under stress. In a paper called "Forty Years After 13 Days," Robert McNamara quoted a part of the letter from Krushchev:

“	Everyone needs peace; both capitalists, if they have not lost their reason, and still more, communists. War is our enemy and a calamity for all people. If indeed war should break out, then it would not be in our power to stop it, for such is the logic of war. I have participated in two wars and I know that war ends only when it has rolled through cities and villages, everywhere sowing death and destruction. I should like you to agree that one cannot give way to pressures; it is necessary to control them. If people do not show wisdom, then in the final analysis they will come to a clash, like blind moles, and then reciprocal extermination will begin. If you have not lost your self-control, then Mr. President we and you ought not now to pull on the end of a rope in which you have tied the knot of war, because the more the two of us pull, the tighter the knot will be tied. And a moment may come when that knot will be tied so tight that even he who tied it will not have the strength to untie it. And then it will be necessary to cut that knot. And what that will mean is not for me to explain to you, because you yourself understand perfectly what terrible forces our countries possess. Let us not only relax the forces pulling on the end of the rope; let us take means to untie the knot. We are ready for this.	”
—Nikita Kruschev

Krushchev was saying that he would remove the missile sites if he promised not to invade Cuba. An invasion of Cuba would make Krushchev look bad and could also lead to a nuclear war. This was the reaction that Kennedy wanted.

The very next day a second letter was sent from Russia to Kennedy. This one looked more official than the first. It also said that the US must take its nuclear missiles out of Turkey if they wanted Russia to take their missiles out of Cuba. It would have been a fair trade because the US missiles in Turkey were close enough to Russia that they could reach most of the important cities and Cuba was close enough to the US that the Russian missiles would reach most of the important US cities. The problem for Kennedy was that he could not publicly agree to remove the US missiles from Turkey because Turkey would then not be protected and they would not be happy. Another problem was that Kennedy and his advisers did not know if Krushchev was still in power. They thought that someone in the Russian government might have overthrown Krushchev. They thought this because the second letter was so much different than the first. Kennedy decided to send a secret message to Krushchev saying that they would remove the missiles from Turkey in a few months as long as they did not tell the public about it. Kennedy then sent an official letter to Krushchev agreeing to the conditions of the first letter and ignoring the second.

Krushchev agreed to the secret message.

On November 1, the missile sites were removed and the problems were over.

Who won the Cuban Missile Crisis?

Nobody really knows who won the Cuban Missile Crisis. Krushchev said that he had won because the United States never bothered Cuba again and the missile sites in Turkey were removed. But he had lost respect from China. China broke off relations with the USSR and Krushchev had to quit.

Khrushchev goals in the crisis had various results:

1. A communist country was closer to the United States. Cuba came out of the crisis still a communist country.
2. Kennedy was pushed in the crisis. In the end, his desire for peace was important to ending the crisis.
3. The missile sites in Turkey were removed, but not in the way that Khrushchev had wanted.

The United States saw Kennedy as the hero who had fought Communism and won.

See also

• Cold war
• Nikita Khrushchev

Other websites

For students' use

• 14 Days in October: The Cuban Missile Crisis - a site geared toward high-school students
• Cuban Missile Crisis on BBC
• Cuban Missile Crisis at Spartacus schoolnet

Complex

• IV. Chronology of Submarine. Contact During the Cuban Missile Crisis. October 1, 1962 - November 14, 1962. Prepared by Jeremy Robinson-Leon and William Burr.
• CIA Documents on the Cuban Missle Crisis, 1962 (.pdf, 354 pgs.) U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, McAuliffe, M. ed., CIA History Staff, 1992.
• Declassified Documents, etc. - Provided by the National Security Archive at The George Washington University.
• Tapes of debates between JFK and his advisors during the crisis
• President Kennedy's Address to the Nation on the Soviet Arms Buildup in Cuba
• Nuclear Files.org Introduction, timeline and articles regarding the Cuban Missile Crisis
• Cuba Havana Documentary Bye Bye Havana is a documentary revealing what Cubans are thinking about today
• October, 1962: DEFCON 4, DEFCON 3, DEFCON 2